


Poison Ivy

by aeiparthenos



Series: Vulpes Inculta and Aurelia of Phoenix [1]
Category: Fallout (Video Games), Fallout 2, Fallout: New Vegas
Genre: Abusive Parents, Arranged Marriage, Caesar's Legion - Major Warning, Canon-Typical Violence, Children, Complicated Relationships, Dead Dove: Do Not Eat, Domestic Bliss, Domestic Violence, F/M, Falling In Love, Father-Daughter Relationship, First Love, Implied/Referenced Domestic Violence, Implied/Referenced Incest, Internalized Misogyny, Love Confessions, Love/Hate, Memory Loss, Miscarriage, Misogyny, Old-Fashioned, Older Man/Younger Woman, Possessive Behavior, Possessive Sex, Pregnancy, Rape/Non-con Elements, Rough Sex, Sex, Sexual Slavery, Size Kink, Slavery, Stillbirth, Teen Pregnancy, Threats of Rape/Non-Con, Timeline Shenanigans, True Love, War
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-05
Updated: 2017-04-07
Packaged: 2018-10-15 04:28:31
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con, Underage
Chapters: 12
Words: 45,423
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10550070
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aeiparthenos/pseuds/aeiparthenos
Summary: Six wakes up confused in Goodsprings without any memory of what has happened to her. She is a young woman with a complicated relationship between her body and mind, having grown up in a culture vasty different from the one she finds herself in, without any memory of who she is or where she's from.A story that starts out as the canon Courier, but develops into AU. The story focus on the Legion, that in itself is a major warning. This work contains some fucked up shit.Photos that I used for inspiration for my characters while writing can be found at: poisonivyzeigel.tumblr.com





	1. The Road to Nipton

Under my thumb  
The squirmin’ dog who’s just had her day, a girl who has just changed her ways  
It’s down to me, yes it is – the way she does just what she’s told, she’s under my thumb  
Ah, say it’s all right  
Under my thumb  
A Siamese cat of a girl, she’s the sweetest, hm, pet in the world  
It’s down to me – the way she talks when she’s spoken to, the change has come, she’s under my thumb  
Ah, take it easy babe  
Under my thumb  
Her eyes are just kept to herself, I can still look at someone else  
It’s down to me, oh that’s what I said  
Say it’s all right, say it’s all – take it easy babe  
\- The Rolling Stones ‘Under My Thumb’

***

She made her way towards the village with the smoke rising up in thick clouds from several places within, as if pyres were burning all over the smallish settlement just north of Primm. She had just recently woken up in Goodsprings, at doc Mitchell’s, being informed she’d been shot in the head and somehow survived. The last week had been nothing short of lunacy to Six – she couldn’t remember anything from before she woke up five days ago, looking around the doc’s shack with hazy eyes and a confused face that made the doc smirk and chuckle as she tried to make sense of her situation.  
She didn’t even remember her name, but the doc had gone through her stuff, finding a note saying something about a chip and a deliverer, a Courier Six and she just assumed it to be her. What else could she do? Come up with a name? No, she wouldn’t do that. She noted that when she spoke, her accent wasn’t entirely different from how the others around the small town spoke and she decided that there must be some people somewhere around here that knew who she was. The only information the people of Goodsprings had given her, was that the man who’d shot and buried her, wore a chequered jacket and was accompanied by Khans. The Great Khans, as it were, a bell rang at the sound of the clan-name, but she couldn’t be certain. Her closest lead was to follow the guy who had tried to kill her and from what she had gathered so far, he was heading towards New Vegas, and apparently now, so was she. Perhaps she could find some answers there?

After a few breaks and stops here and there, along the way – trying to fill out her obvious and somewhat worrisome lack of caps with the odd job, she was now following the road towards what the signs told her was Nipton, when the sky started to darken and the wind blew up more and more sand from all directions in her face. A sandstorm, of course, Six thought and started to dig into her purse after a scarf and road goggles to protect her eyes and mouth. Perhaps she could find shelter in this town ahead? Even though the smoke coming up from the town in the horizon was worrying, there had to be at least some shelter to be had.  
She wrapped the khaki scarf around her lower face, covering her mouth and nose and drew the goggles down her eyes, tipping her Stetson over her forehead. The scars just behind her temples were still sore, but she no longer needed a large bandage around her head, only a larger Band-Aid keeping dirt out of the stitches. The doc had told her she had surprisingly good healing flesh, and she could be taking the stitches out in about a week’s time – she had had them for almost two weeks now, anyway. She’d been awake for a week, but she had spent almost a week before that, unconsciously being cared for by the doc, before her mind found it was whole enough for her to stir from the bizarre dreams of her comatose state.

The little town of Goodsprings had done good by her, helping her recover and when it finally seemed the right time for her to move on, to whatever used to be her life, they had equipped her with purified water, food and clothes. She had been wearing military boots and a pair of tight dark denims when the metal fellow had found her six feet under. Her coat and tank top had been discarded by the doc, too filthy and destroyed by her mucky blood and grime and so they had given her a simple white-ish NCR t-shirt, obviously having belonged to a man before her, as it was very loose fitting and way too large for her lithe, but curvy frame. She had tucked the t-shirt into the front of her denims and rolled up the sleeves a bit – the desert was hot, even though the sky had gone dark. She had a blanket and a bedroll in her pack, to keep her warm during the cold desert nights. A side from that, the doc told her she’d been carrying a caravan shotgun and a combat knife, which she was given back along with a few caps, NCR dollars, ammo and a pair of binoculars. She had sheathed the knife in a strap around her thigh while the shotgun hung over her shoulder together with her pack. Her smaller purse was fastened to her hip – she looked every bit like a courier, if that is what she had been to start with. She really had no idea, but it didn’t seem implausible. 

The harsh winds made her long hair fly around in all kinds of directions and the Stetson provided little protection from the snaps to her face from her wavy hair tousling in the wind. But she came closer and closer to Nipton with every step that she took – she wasn’t far away from shelter now, only a few more minutes on the deserted road, then she’d be safely tucked away somewhere from the storming winds. There seemed to be some fires in the town, but it wasn’t unusual for houses to burn – the electrics were old and unsafe and every now and again, if people weren’t careful enough, the dust combined with unstable electronics made fore large, devastating fires. Or so Six thought, it seemed like a decent explanation.

***

“YEAH! Who won the lottery? I DID!”  
Six entered the town of Nipton when she noticed red banners with a golden bull in the middle – it seemed strangely familiar to her, but she couldn’t quite put her finger on how, or from where she recognized it. Just as she entered, a young man in blue clothes that looked just like the prison-clothes of the dynamite-carrying Powder Gangers she had executed in Primm came running towards her, screaming and waving his arms around. He sounded completely deluded and his eyes were wide like the eyes of a lunatic.  
“What lottery?” Six asked with some careful hesitation as he stopped just before her, breathing heavy with a flustered expression on his face.  
“What lottery? _The_ lottery, that’s what lottery! Are you stupid? The only lottery that matters! Oh my god, smell that air!” He roared enthusiastically as he grabbed her shoulders and shook her. “Couldn’t you just drink it like booze?”  
“Let go of me, you maniac!” Six snarled as the lunatic ‘whoa’-ed in her face, he seemed to be completely off his head and she begun to feel afraid that he would try to attack her like one of those crazed raiders that crawled around in the desert. She reached for her knife and pointed it against his throat, “Back off!” she shouted, trying to deafen his roaring, but he didn’t seem to notice the knife, instead he kept shouting and howling, standing uncomfortably close to her, touching her. She had warned him, but he seemed to dazed to even care about her obvious hostility, so she slit his throat with her knife when he didn’t stand back. “Goddamn it” Six spat as she wiped the blood from her knife off on the blue denim jacket the now dead maniac wore. What the hell was happening here? Six thought to herself as she sheathed her knife and decided it was too late to back away now. Perhaps he was the only maniac? At least that is what she desperately hoped.

When she walked in through Nipton, she quickly reached what must have been the main street before the war, since it led towards the Town Hall. When she looked up and around her, she immediately halted in her steps, gasping quite vocally to herself. The long main street was littered with crosses – crosses with people strung up on them. Men and women, predominantly men in the same blue prison-clothes as the maniac she had just slit the throat off, but also a few younger ones – perhaps not children, but young enough to be teenagers. Some of them were still breathing, others hanging limply on the large crosses, she could hear moans coming from some, cries from others. The only word she could come to think of was – _righteousness_ – and she had no idea why, since the scene before her was gruesome, it was nothing short of disgusting.  
farther ahead, she saw what looked like men in red and black armor, crushing the kneecaps of some of the victims on the crosses with a large sledge. Six noticed some movement further up, on the stairs to the Town Hall and she soon saw that those who caused that movement, had noticed her and had started walking towards her.

It was a man. With a skinned dog’s head wrapped upon and around his own head. Behind her goggles, her eyes narrowed as she took the sight in, something about this man was too familiar for her to be comfortable with it. As he closed in on her with quick steps, she tried to assess his features, but it was difficult due to his own road goggles covering his eyes and the mutt shrouding his hair and ears. He was of average height, a few inches taller than herself, with a lithe but muscled body, telling her that he obviously lived a life with a lot of exercise and movement. The large machete strapped to his hip and the blood on his hands and armor made it obvious to her that he probably got quite some exercise from chopping things, such as people, up with that large knife. Or sawing things apart with the ripper tucked in under the fastening of his baltea. Baltea? How did she know that word? If Six wasn’t already very confused by her whole situation, she’d almost believe she’d lost her mind. 

“Ave”, the man with the dog’s head greeted her with a raised hand, stopping in front of her. His voice was cold but soothing like velvet with an unnervingly soft tone to it as he greeted her. Something in how his tin lips moved, combined with his high cheekbones and the soft ring of his voice struck a chord within her. Her stomach knotted and she felt a realization dawn on her – there was only one word that echoed inside her head as she stared at him behind her goggles and that word was somehow combined with big fat flashing letters of danger.  
_Husband_.  
“Don’t worry, I won’t have you lashed to a cross like the rest of these degenerates. It’s useful that you happened by”, he told her in a sharp and alert tone, still retaining the velvety ring of his voice. Behind her goggles, Six panicked, she had no idea what she should or even could do. Was this her husband? She didn’t even know his name and he didn’t act as if he recognized her. Though, her face was more or less fully covered by the goggles and the scarf. And did she even want him to recognize her? With the amount of fear she suddenly felt, along with the raw panic – she couldn’t imagine that the combination of that, with a marital status was something good. Considering he just proclaimed he could have her put up on a cross, she decided it was best to keep as quiet as possible – keep to nodding and gestures with her hands, if nothing else. “I want you to witness the fate of the town of Nipton, to memorize every detail. And then, when you move on? I want you to teach everyone you meet the lesson that Caesar’s Legion taught here, especially any NCR troops you run across” 

The way he said Caesar, with a hard K – suddenly made so much more sense to her. Everything suddenly made sense. When Sunny back in Goodsprings had warned her about _Cesar’s fucking douchebag-sadists trotting ‘round in their skirts, enslaving women and children, rapin’ and killin’ for the fun of it_ she hadn’t realized she’d meant Caesar’s Legion. Had Sunny said it the way it was supposed to be pronounced, a bell would have rang inside Six’s head – a large bell of danger and keep-the-fuck-away. But now, the realization had come too late and at least she was thankful for the sandstorm forcing her to cover her face up so completely.  
Six nodded to the man standing before her, but it seemed as if a silent nod just wouldn’t do as he moved closer to her, seemingly staring down at her shorter frame, probably inspecting her. Six’s heart was already beating rapidly inside her chest and she could feel her breathing increasing – in a bad way – in the worst way possible. Had he recognized her? How long since she had met him? How long had she been apart from him? And what the hell was his name? Why could she not remember it? Damn it all to hell! Six screamed inside her head.  
“Of course”, Six said in a strained voice, trying to obscure her natural voice as much as possible, without sounding unnatural. “I will do as you say” 

The man raised an eyebrow and seemed to study her further, looking at her from top to bottom, scrutinizing every visible feature. She was already sweating from the heat in the desert, but the beads of sweat rolling down from her hair and the brim of her Stetson, over her neck and down onto her back increased as she could feel his eyes roaming over her body.  
“What’s your name, profligate?” he asked her without emotion in his stony face.  
“Uh”, PANIC, her head shouted as she searched for the words – she didn’t even know her real name, what was she supposed to say? If she took too long to answer such a simple question, she’d probably need to use her voice even further to explain something she’d have to construct in the moment to him.  
“Six”, she finally answered with the same strained slightly modified voice.  
“Really?” the man snorted and reached for her face, lightly touching the small part of skin showing between her goggles and scarf. Six quickly took a step back and he drew back his hand. “Well, then I bid you Vale, until we meet again”  
He then turned his back to her and walked off and Six’s heart was slowly calming down again and the blasting winds was beginning to cool her heated skin with the help from the moist of her sweat. She let out a breath she hadn’t realized she was holding and watched as the patrol of about 20 men moved out of the town. _Until we meet again_ …

***

_Aurelia_.  
He knew there was something uncanny about the woman he had approached in Nipton. So much so, that Vulpes asked one of his recruits to stay behind and follow her, keep an eye on her to see if he could gather some more information about her. At first, Vulpes could have sworn that she looked just like his runaway wife as she approached the town – and the way she froze when he walked towards her, his suspicions became even greater. She seemed unwilling to speak, but he had been able to get her to tell him her name – Six – well, that was ridiculous. Apart from her clothing, the hat, goggles and scarf obscuring her features, he was pretty sure that woman was his wife. Somewhat skinnier, but the curves of her body were the same – it seemed impossible for her to become so skinny her body lost their curvaceous nature. After all, she was a woman, made to be soft creatures bearing the children of men.  
He could hear that she had tried to change her voice, how stupid had she become? Did she really think she could have him fooled with that meek performance? As soon as she opened her mouth, he knew it was her, he knew she was Aurelia. His Aurelia, his pet, his Lupa.  
He hadn’t seen her for two years, she had been keeping herself well hidden away from his Frumentarii’s eyes and he thought it almost ironic that she all of a sudden would waltz into Nipton of all places, serving herself up to him on a plate. It was almost too good to be true, considering that the girl he married was anything but stupid. Was she perhaps playing him?

Vulpes had loved her, he still did – but he didn’t enjoy admitting that fact, not to himself and he would never admit it to someone else. She had chosen to leave him, to run away and humiliate him. As if his relationship to the bastard who was his father in law hadn’t been strained from the very start, her bolting had made it even worse. He had been a decanus when he married the slave daughter of Aurelius of Phoenix, but he rose fast through the ranks and now he was the first of Caesar’s Frumentarii, and if Vulpes’ mere presence enraged the centurion Aurelius to begin with, his sudden carrier within the Frumentarii hadn’t made it better. Vulpes thought the man would be glad to have his worthless spawn married off to a decanus and later, one of Caesar’s officers, but it only seemed to invoke spite within the centurion. The centurion who hadn’t cared the least for his daughter, whom Vulpes viewed as precious, more worthy than any other woman he had ever laid his eyes on. Aurelius had let the girl grow up amongst the slaves and when she was eight years old, he had raped her mother to death and possibly eaten her. At least that is what the gossip told, but considering Aurelius person, he could very well imagine there was some truth to it. Vulpes had been a mere recruit of 19 at the time, stationed in southern Arizona and he came to Flagstaff the first time for his promotion to decanus when he was 21 years old. Aurelia had only been 10 years old then and it would be another four years before they married. 

Perhaps he hadn’t been the most light-handed husband, but it was law within the Legion to physically punish an impudent wife. At least she had been treated better as his wife, than she was as a simple slave. After all, she had gone from being a very much useless slave who burned the food she cooked, sliced her fingers open when she tried to chop vegetables, who couldn’t sew and was too weak to carry things around and constantly acting defiantly and talking back to her superiors, to becoming the wife of a decanus and later a Legion officer. Of course, it had taken some time for him to break her down from her childish ways, but eventually she had become reasonably pliable and he had been able to remove her bomb collar that she’d been wearing since her mother died, letting her roam around freely in Flagstaff and later around Fortification Hill, when he became stationed there due to Caesar’s offensive on Hoover Dam. 

It was during one of his trips to New Vegas, that she escaped, leaving their son behind, the selfish cunt. Sure, she’d given him a son, an heir and a legacy – but she knew as well as he did, that he couldn’t possibly accept her just up and leaving him like that. She was his property, by law he owned her.  
But if she wanted to play that game with him, he would gladly pay. No matter where she found herself, she’d still belong to him – deep inside – Aurelia knew this as well as he did. He belonged to her and she to him – it was a bond that could never be broken, it was a bond deeper than just that between a husband and a wife, their bond was, for lack of better wording, spiritual.  
Aurelia had fallen in love with him, but she fought a constant battle against her own will and her mind’s deluded notion of independence and freedom. Deep inside, she knew her place, but no matter in what way he had reminded her of her place – her mind poisoned her. But she loved him, she always would. This, Vulpes knew and as he walked through the desert towards Cottonwood Cove, he thought that this must be a sign from the Gods, that it was time to reclaim his obstinate wife.

***


	2. A Meet and Greet or two

Shit, shit, shit, shit, shit.   
It didn’t really matter how many times she said it to herself in her head. She had been so blissfully unaware until now. As she followed the old highway north, things were starting to fall into place, some clearer than others. The meeting with _him_ in Nipton had stirred memories within her and they were only unpleasant ones. She had a strange feeling inside her, of attraction, of want and of a need – that perhaps she had once loved that man, or something very similar to what you emotionally would deem as love. When he touched her cheek, she could feel something very close to electricity connecting them and she didn’t know what as of yet, but there was something between them that connected them in more ways than a marriage.   
She felt confused, well, that in itself was an understatement. She felt ready to jump off of any cliff presented before her, her head spun around and around as she tried to focus on the road. 

_Come on Six, do not think too much, just move further away from that man. Your mind is obviously telling you he’s bad news. Best to keep away, as far away as possible_. He had a danger about his ways, there was no doubt about it. Fuck, he had just crucified a whole town, he couldn’t possibly be anything but dangerous. Why was she married to such an awful man? Not that she hadn’t murdered, only during her trek from Goodsprings to Novac, she had shot and knifed attackers. But they were just that, attackers. Either it was in self-defense, or because they had a bounty on their heads that she needed to collect for caps.   
Killing for caps, that made her a bad person, didn’t it?   
The questions popping up inside her skull seemed to be endless and they kept pestering her the whole way to Novac, comparing herself to the man she encountered in Nipton. The crucifier. 

She had waited out the storm inside one of the small trailers in Nipton, she hadn’t dared to enter one of the houses, after she had snuck a peak inside the Town Hall and almost been attacked by one of the hounds left inside by her _husband_ and the men he seemed to have commanded. Could she actually be married to him? She asked herself as she sat with her legs drawn up, leaning her chin onto her knees. As she searched her mind, she tried to remember something to do with a wedding, a home, a life before all this, before this confusion. It seemed her memory wouldn’t be commanded, the words coming to her, only came of its own will and she couldn’t force the memories to appear and explain her strange and confusing feelings.   
The night in the trailer turned out to be a long one and when she finally fell asleep, it was already dawn and the wind had started to calm. She slept for a few hours before heading north out of Nipton and continue towards were she had been setting out, to New Vegas.   
That strange man with a fucking dog on his head might well be her husband, but she needed to find the other man, the one in the chequered jacket who had tried to kill her. Perhaps he could tell her more of who she really was?

***

Six had made her way to Novac, it was a strange little community based around a gift shop shaped like a huge dinosaur. Dinky, the woman in the motel’s reception, Jeannie-May, had told her was the name of the dino. Inside the mouth of Dinky, there was always a sniper, Jeannie-May said. Six needed caps and on her way to Nipton, she had been able to pick up some junk that she could possibly sell, as well as some weapons from a group of raiders that attacked her just south of Ranger station Charlie.  
After selling most of the garbage and all of the weapons to the owner of the dino-gift shop, she out of pure curiosity headed up the stairs to the mouth of Dinky. She had greeted most of the other residents of the little town and felt she might as well say hello to the sniper hauled up there.

“Goddamn it! Don’t sneak up on me like that. What do you want?”  
A large man, tall and with impressive and slightly scary muscles turned on his heels as she opened the door. He wore a red beret and dark shades, even though it was evening and dark outside. He spoke with an annoyed snarl as he looked down on Six through his shades and crossed his arms over his chest.   
“Oh, sorry. Expecting visitors?” Six tried to pull of a careful smile to ease the situation somewhat, but it didn’t seem to help defuse anything. The tall sniper kept looking at her with a sardonic face.   
“Yeah, I guess”, he grunted. “But not like you”   
“What?”  
“Maybe it should’ve been you I was expecting all along. Why are you here?” the sniper asked and corrected the shades on his chiseled nose.   
“I just wanted to see who was up here”, Six tried curling her lips upwards again, “And check out the view, I guess”   
“I think you better leave”, the sniper retorted with a snarl.   
“Hey, just wait a minute. Do you treat everyone around here like this?” she gave up on the polite conversation, the man was obviously not interested in a meet and greet, she should have known better. “Don’t answer, I’ll just leave you alone, all right? Sorry for disturbing you”, Six muttered and turned to leave.   
“Wait, maybe you shouldn’t go. Not just yet” the sniper grabbed her arm to hinder her from leaving.   
“Why?” Six arched a brow and looked at the man in the red beret.   
“I need someone I can trust. You’re a stranger, that’s a start”   
“You only trust strangers? What do you want?”   
“This town, nobody looks me straight in the eye anymore. I want you to find something out for me. I don’t know if there’s anything to find, but I need someone to try. My wife was taken from our house by Legion slavers one night while I was on watch. They knew when to come and what route to take and they only took Carla. Someone set it up, I don’t know who”   
“You’re trying to track down your wife?” Six asked, now with both her brows raised in surprise. He was a strange one, this sniper – who in their right mind only trusted complete strangers, no matter the weirdness of the town they lived in?   
“My wife’s dead, I want the son of a bitch who sold her”   
“All right, what do I do if I find this person?”   
“Bring him out in front of the nest here while I’m on duty, I work nights. I’ll give you my NCR beret to put on. It’ll be our signal, so I know you’re standing with him and I’ll take care of the rest. I need to do this myself”   
“Okay, I’ll see what I can do to help you” Six nodded and took the beret the sniper offered her.   
“Good, I’ll make it worth your while. One more thing, we shouldn’t speak again, not until it’s over. No one in town knows that I know what happened to my wife. Best they never know, or the Legion will be after me next” the sniper coughed and then nodded for Six to leave. 

She spent the night looking around the town, searching for clues as to what happened to the sniper’s wife and after some lock picking and sneaking, she was able to break into the motel receptionist’s safe and found a receipt stamped with a large red mark of the bull, detailing the purchase of one pregnant woman, to Caesar’s Legion, signed by a M. Licinius Crassus of the Consul Officiorum ab Famulato. The secretary of Slave Affairs, Six noted. The receipt mentioned Jeannie-May, the receptionist as the seller of a Carla Boone, who must have been the sniper’s wife and her unborn child.   
With the evidence in hand, she closed the safe and walked out into the breaking dawn and walked towards the house down the road, which mailbox she had noted had the name Jeannie-May Crawford written on it and knocked on the door. With a little bit of luck and persuasion, Six was able to lure the woman out in only her nightgown to come look at something spectacular just in front of Dinky. It only took the sniper a few seconds to put a bullet through the older woman’s head, after Six had switched her Stetson for the red beret. She then made her way up the stairs in the gift shop to the sniper’s nest again, to speak to the sniper and show him the receipt. 

“What will you do now?” Six asked, after the sniper had gone over the evidence, sighing to himself and rubbing his temples.   
“I don’t know, I won’t be staying, I know that. Don’t see much point in anything right now, except hunting legionaries”   
Hunting legionaries, huh? Six thought to herself. The thought of what she had witnessed in Nipton, how conflicted she felt about her initial reaction to the sight of the crosses – righteousness, but combined with utter disgust and then the realization who the cold-voiced man greeting her was. She felt afraid, she didn’t know if she actually needed to be afraid, but from what she’d seen and heard of the Legion thus far, it didn’t seem like a bad idea to have someone like this man with her.   
“You could come with me”  
“This ain’t gonna end well”, the sniper frowned, but nodded at the same time. “The name’s Boone, by the way”   
“Six”, Six answered and offered out her hand, but Boone ignored it and simply looked at her. “All right”, she let out a nervous chuckle, “Let’s go then”   
“Yeah, let’s get out of here”, Boone strapped his sniper rifle over his shoulder and pushed himself before Six.

***

It didn’t take Boone long to collect his belongings from the motel, first however, Six wanted – no, _needed_ a nap. She hadn’t had a full night’s sleep since Goodsprings and the doc’s cot, she was so tired she could have fallen asleep standing. There had been so many things going on both inside her head and around her that she had almost forgotten about sleep all together but when she saw Boone’s bed, she couldn’t help herself. Boone hesitated, but eventually went and locked the door as Six stooped down onto the bed and fell asleep within seconds.

She woke up a good few hours later, to find Boone sitting in a chair next to the door, sleeping, still with his shades and beret on. As she stretched her arms and legs, sitting up on the edge of the bed, Boone flinched awake and immediately coughed and reached down his pocket for a pack of cigarettes.   
“Ready to get going?” Six rubbed her eyes and tousled her long hair before going to the bathroom to wash her face, empty her bladder and adjust the bindings holding her breasts in place.   
“Yeah”, she heard the sniper sigh as he drew smoke into his lungs. 

They left Novac in the evening, stocked up on ammunition, food and water. Six had been able to run over to the gift shop, buying herself another pair of pants, in leather this time, another t-shirt, a tank top and socks without wholes in them. The sizes were off, as usual, but she learned it was better to settle for pants that were a bit too tight, as they seemed to adjust to her body after a while, no matter their material. The things she wore on her upper body could be a bit too big, it didn’t matter – as long as they weren’t too small, then it just became too uncomfortable. She pushed the Stetson down on her head and patted her pockets, purse and pack to make sure she had everything with her before she walked out in the soothingly cool desert evening.   
Six and Boone continued north, keeping to the highway and staying out of as much trouble as possible. During their way, they ran into rangers and other travellers, such as merchants and couriers – some of them had some information regarding the man in the chequered jacket that proved useful, others about the Khans that had accompanied the man who shot her and the clues led them to a group of Khans caught up in a conflict with NCR-soldiers in Boulder City. There, after helping the NCR-soldiers mediate between them and the Khans, Six got further information about her killer, his name was Benny and he was a chairman of one of the casino’s in New Vegas. Turned out Boone knew just which casino it was and so after an afternoon of rest, they continued towards the large glowing city that presented itself with towers and lights in the horizon. 

During their travels to New Vegas, they had been harassed by legionaries – mostly because Boone couldn’t resist shooting towards them as soon as he saw something red lurking around in the shadows or behind the hills and sand dunes – raiders, all kinds of different animals and just plain stupid thieves, trying their luck and ending up on the other side of a sniper rifle.   
When they paused at the 188 trading post, they met a woman who called herself Veronica, she seemed a bit deluded, talking about a family that lived in a bunker that she was getting supplies for. She wasn’t very difficult to pry information from, as she after a few questions admitted to being a scribe from the Brotherhood of Steel – whoever they were, Six thought to herself – but Veronica made both Boone and Six promise to keep it a secret. Boone, distant as always, barely paid attention and shrugged his shoulders while he lit another cigarette. Six had to ask Boone later about these Brotherhood of Steel-people, but since he didn’t protest immediately, Veronica could come along with them. She wanted an adventure, however, Six didn’t know if walking the last few hours of a dusty road to New Vegas counted as an adventure, but the company was nice – she supposed.   
Six was also supposed to meet a woman in New Vegas, who she’d run into at the Mojave Outpost, when she was taking a break between Primm and Nipton. The woman ran a caravan company, but had had some trouble with it as of late, to put things mildly and so she drank her sorrows away at the outpost and as two lonesome women in a bar filled with NCR-soldiers, they had found each other and started talking. Six had felt sorry for her and agreed to try and help her as best she could, however, she explained to the woman, Cass was her name, that she needed to travel to New Vegas first and deal with some business of her own before she could help her. Cass had nodded drunkenly and told her to meet her in Freeside, one of the more dingy ‘suburbs’ of the New Vegas Strip. 

The road from the 188 trading post had been smooth, but as soon as they stepped inside Freeside, a pair of thugs hauled a baseball bat in Boone’s stomach and knifed Six, trying to pry her pack of her back – fortunately, Veronica could fight them off quickly with her power fist and soon Boone was caught up, fist fighting his attacker, decking him within seconds.   
Six however, bleed and from the look of it, she needed stitches. Boone and Veronica dragged her along to a scabby looking part of Freeside and in through a gate, to a court filled with tents, shielded by high walls. It was the Old Mormon Fort, Boone explained and told her about the Followers of the Apocalypse. The name of the organization sounded familiar, but as with so much else, Six couldn’t remember anything specific, she could only recognize the name somehow.   
As Boone dragged her into one of the tents, shouting for a ‘medic’ and a tall man who looked to be in his late 30’s came rushing towards them. He had blonde hair drawn back from his temples and a pair of black brim glasses and was clad in a white doctors robe. He pointed for Boone to lay Six down on a cot and quickly worked her t-shirt out of her pants, assessing the bleeding stab wound in her side.   
“You’re going to live”, the doctor said with a strained voice, “But this is going to hurt”   
Six nodded as he injected her with something that made her feel slightly more calm and made the area around her wound numb so he could clean it and stitch her back up. The cleaning of the wound was the worst, but Six did what she could to lay still as the doctor worked on her. The doctor had chased Boone and Veronica out of the tent while he worked, but he himself wasn’t exactly a man of few words as he kept mumbling to himself while working.   
“Non alios genitalibus exemptis”, the doctor mumbled when he felt with his fingertips around Six’s abdomen and up around her wound.  
“Tibi gratias ago deorum”, Six sighed unaware of herself. The doctor froze, looking straight at her.   
“What did you just say?” he frowned, looking down at her lying on the cot.   
“What?” Six answered, stunned by his sudden stillness and surprise.   
“You speak Latin?”   
Six was confused again and didn’t even begin to know what to answer. “Uh, do I?” she looked back at the doctor, who was now watching her with suspicion.   
“Yes, you obviously do, since you just answered me in Latin. Are you a doctor? Or are you connected to…the Legion somehow? A former slave?”   
“I…”, Six hesitated and bit her lower lip as she mulled over her answers in her head. “To be completely honest, I don’t really know”   
“You don’t know?” the doctor’s eyes narrowed.   
“I, uh, I got shot in the head around a month ago – been having trouble remembering anything since”, she almost whispered. Somehow she felt herself blush at the admittance of her near death.   
“You…You got shot in the head? And survived?” the doctor immediately started turning her head around, looking for the bullet holes and quickly found them on the left side of her temple. “The wounds seems to have healed well enough in such a short time, and you’ve had the stitches removed”   
“Yeah, my friend in the beret out there helped me. The doctor who stitched me up instructed me in how I could do it myself”   
“He did a good job”, the doctor nodded. “Are you experiencing any symptoms from the head wounds? Headaches? Dizziness? Nausea? How’s your eyesight?”   
“No, nothing like that – from what I know. Been a bit short of breath the last few days, but I guess I’m just tired. Been walking a bit”   
“You should rest. After such a major trauma to the head, it’s not wise walking around and especially not wise walking around getting stabbed”   
“It’s not as if I planned on getting stabbed”, Six mumbled with some disgrace and looked up at the doctor.   
“No, I suppose not”, the doctor nodded. “So, you don’t know how you come to understand and speak Latin? It seemed to come quite natural to you”   
“As I said, I don’t even know my real name”  
“All right”, the doctor nodded again, “Well, you’re all stitched up. I’ll let you rest here for a while before you leave, just to make sure you’re okay. If you need anything, just ask for someone to come get me. I’m Arcade”   
“Thanks”, she smiled, “I’m called Six, until I find out my real name, anyway”   
Arcade gave a small but controlled smile before he rose and walked out of the tent, leaving Six to rest while the strange substances injected into her worked on her body. It had left her somewhat drowsy and she was tired to begin with, it didn’t take long for her to fall into a slightly drug-induced sleep.

***

It had been three weeks since Vulpes had sent the recruit to follow Aurelia and now he finally stood before Vulpes in his tent, reporting her movements drawing closer and closer to New Vegas through the Mojave. Apparently she had shacked up with one of the laid off NCR recon snipers in Novac, “the pale one”, the recruit said. _Craig Boone_ , Vulpes noted to himself, _he will look exceptionally good hanging from a cross_. They had travelled north together, through Boulder City before finally arriving in New Vegas, on the way they had picked up another person, some woman in baggy clothes with a power fist around her right arm – but the recruit didn’t know much about her. He had to keep his distance ever since Boone had started to travel with Aurelia, the sniper had even taken a shot at the recruit at one point, when he got too close.  
 _Amateur_ , Vulpes sighed silently to himself, gritting his teeth, as he listened to the recruit blabbering on. When they had arrived in Freeside, there had seemed to be some kind of commotion, which left two thugs dead right by the entrance and then the three travellers were gone. The recruit had no idea where they could have gone and therefore he had decided to turn back towards Cottonwood and eventually the Fort.

Vulpes kept his head and made no show of emotion towards the recruit when he gestured for him to leave. When he was yet again alone in his tent, he leaned into his hands and sighed loudly, rubbing his temples. The prospect of having Aurelia back had done things with him, made it harder for him to concentrate on his work – his mind kept lingering on her. Her hair had grown even longer than it was before and the waviness and curls of it stirred notions of wanting to feel her within him. The few fast seconds when he touched her cheek had left him longing. It was a longing nothing could satisfy, nothing but Aurelia herself. He had been without her for two long years and he had gone through a large amount of slaves since she left, slaves that he had either taken himself or that had been granted to him by Caesar. But none of them could satisfy the burning feeling within him that longed after his Lupa, his she-wolf, the only woman who could possibly tame his deepest desires and longings.   
He hadn’t seen his son for almost two years, he couldn’t stand looking at him – as he resembled his mother too much, reminded him of the one person who’d left him and got away. He had let her get away. He hadn’t gone after her, he’d sent out some of his men, surely, but he himself hadn’t tried to hunt her down. There was no point, if she wanted to stay hidden, she would have kept herself away. Why had she suddenly showed up? 

As soon as he got his hands on her, she’d have to be punished, of course. But he would go easy on her – she was the mother of his son, after all. Atticus had been without both his parents for too long, sent back from Fortification Hill to Flagstaff a month after Aurelia had left, to be cared for by the priestesses in the Temple. How old was he now? Vulpes thought to himself. Four years, since he was born in 2277, when Aurelia was 16 years old. Vulpes had fathered two more children during Aurelia’s absence, but they had all been girls and born from slaves, therefore they were being raised as slaves. Would he conceive another daughter that actually survived from his wife, the girl would be raised within the temple and then married off to a higher ranked legionary, but the daughters of his slaves – no matter if he was the father or not, were worthless. But the Legion needed slaves and soldiers, so he had decided to spare the daughters, but he couldn’t officially recognize them as his own.  
He had to go to New Vegas, she was there now. He couldn’t just haul her off with him back to the Fort, considering her current company, however, he could make his presence known to her and speak with her. They had been married for six years now and he knew she could be reasoned with, and manipulated, even though it was surprisingly difficult, for a woman. But that is what he enjoyed about her, she wasn’t easy to handle and you had to earn her pliability. He had earned her love, he only had to take back her loyalty and he knew exactly how he was going to do that. The way he did most everything else, through cunning, manipulation, lies and emotional blackmail.

***

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My Latin-skills are not the best, you all just have to live with it.


	3. The City of Sins

“There are rumors”, Alerio said as he sipped his cold beer, leaning over the bar. “That a courier of the Mojave Express got shot in the head with two bullets and survived. They say, she crawled out of her own grave and has been seen roaming the desert, seeking revenge”   
Vulpes couldn’t help himself as he chuckled, “It sounds like a ghost story for children, my friend”  
“Well, I agree. However, I’ve heard that these rumors has upset one of the chairmen of the Tops, the Benny-fella”   
“And why would a ghost be upsetting him? Was he the one trying to put the courier in the grave?”   
“So the rumor goes, at least”, Alerio nodded, “But it’s just rumors”   
“Why is this important?” Vulpes raised an eyebrow and looked at his fellow Frumentarius. Every rumor in the city was of some importance, one way or another and this was certainly a fascinating story – but they needed to find out more about the entire situation before it had any real value to the Legion. The courier that had been shot had to either be an NCR spy, or just a simple courier. Both the NCR and the Legion had spies within the Mojave Express, but as Caesar seldom employed women, and most of the spies were Frumentarii – this woman was not one of their spies. It still peaked his interest, however and whatever Alerio chose to answer regarding its importance, it was something they would have to keep their eyes on.   
“It’s been rumored this courier, was delivering something of importance”  
“Hence the bullets in her head”  
“Yes”   
“What do you know about this woman and what she was supposedly delivering?”   
“Well, you know how these tribals are, always conspiring and bickering over who can gain the most control over the Strip. They’re in constant war with each other, the Chairmen, the Omertas and the White Gloves – what could be valuable enough to put a courier of the Mojave Express in the dirt for it? And why is this Benny pissing his pants over the courier rising from her grave?” 

Vulpes nodded patiently as Alerio kept on stating the obvious, hoping he wouldn’t waste too much time getting to his point of the matter.   
“Some have been whispering about a Platinum Chip that would gain you control over the Strip. Apparently, this chip was of great importance to Mr. House”, Alerio smirked.   
“If it was of such importance, then why use the Mojave Express for the delivering of this chip? It seems rather…foolish”, Vulpes eyed his glass of bourbon, studying the light amber liquid as it swirled around with his movements of the glass.   
“Apparently, they had some system set up in place, with several couriers, trying to make the transport as secure as possible. But yes, I would agree the whole set up was rather amateurish in its execution”   
Vulpes hummed under his breath as he mulled over the information for a spell, “Do we know who this courier is?” he straightened his back and reached into the inner pocket of his jacket, drawing out some caps to pay for their drinks, readying himself to leave.   
“Just some woman working for the Express, called Courier Six – no other name is known at the moment, but I can easily find out”, Alerio emptied his bottle and put it down on the bar before him. 

Courier Six. _Six_.   
Could it be? A smile spread across Vulpes’ lips as he put two and two together. So that is what Aurelia had been up to during her absence from him? Working as a courier – of course she would have, the work would suit her, independent as she’s always been, being able to roam freely across the entire west. She had always wanted to travel freely, being able to discover the rotting wasteland. Vulpes had never understood her fascination and want for travelling and discovering the irradiated harsh environment that the Great War had left behind in its wake – but then again, he had been forced to travel ever since he became old enough to fight Caesar’s battles. Aurelia had never had the chance, being born a slave and woman. The longest she had travelled before she escaped, was between Phoenix and Flagstaff, and then from Flagstaff to Fortification Hill.   
Well, this was indeed a pleasant surprise.   
“Do you have any information about the couriers whereabouts?” Vulpes asked Alerio.   
“She’s apparently the only person since the Great War who’s entered the Lucky 38 and from what I’ve gathered, she’s staying there with some friends”   
“Hm”, Vulpes snorted. “Keep an eye on the 38 and make sure someone follows her and her companions. Send someone to inform our Lord about this, she might just be very useful to our cause.”  
“Of course”, Alerio nodded.   
“By the way, are you still in possession of the sewer-maps, detailing the entire pre-war sewer system of this city?”   
Alerio nodded, “I’ll have them delivered to you. You staying with the Gloves or at 21?”   
“Our normal suite with the Gloves, this time”   
“All right, you’ll have them by this evening, sir”

***

With the help of her Mojave Express-passport, Six could easily enter the Strip, where the robot from Goodsprings, Victor, immediately greeted her. He was a strange bot, suspicious, continuing to follow her around first Goodsprings, then Novac and now, he was the first thing she saw once the gates shut closed behind her. He invited her into the Lucky 38, informing her that his boss, a Mr. House wanted to speak with her as soon as possible. Six hesitated, since she needed to pay the Tops a visit, paying Benny the chairman in the chequered jacket a visit. However, her living accommodations in Freeside hadn’t been the best and she didn’t want to wander into the Tops looking completely out of place. As she spoke to Victor, she noted the mixture of people moving about the Strip, they were either gamblers and tourists or NCR-soldiers. Just across from the Lucky 38 was Gomorrah, with women wearing as few clothes as possible, posing seductively, gawking at the passers by – trying to lure people into the building behind them. Prostitutes, felt like a perfectly reasonable conclusion to Six. She was just about to agree to enter the Lucky 38 with Victor when she spotted a man sitting on a bench a few yards away, reading a newspaper. Like most other men on the Strip, he wore a suit and a fedora – looking like the average gambler – but he wasn’t reading his newspaper. He was staring straight at her and his eyes unnerved her. She decided to ignore the man, she did stand out from the others around here, with her shaggy-looking clothes and Stetson. She was filthy and blood still stained her t-shirt from her stab wound, so perhaps there was a perfectly sound explanation for this man to be eyeing her like he was? She winked at him, to see his reaction and as soon as she did, his dark brown eyes looked back down into the newspaper again.

Mr. House explained the utmost importance of the Platinum Chip she had been delivering for him, that this ‘Benny’ now was in possession of – of course Mr. House wanted her to get it back from Benny, _by any means necessary_. According to House, Six owed him that. Six couldn’t help but to be of a somewhat different opinion, considering she had almost died delivering that stupid package for this man behind the screen. He offered her an increased payment and also the presidential suite at the Lucky 38 to stay in indefinitely, and she needed somewhere to stay, so she agreed.   
In the Lucky 38, there were bots everywhere and Six suspected Mr. House was something not unlike pre-war artificial intelligence himself, but at the moment, she was all too weary to even care. Boone and Veronica had waited for Six outside the casino and she went to fetch them, since Victor had informed her that her friends could stay in the 38 with her. It turned out, the presidential suite was an entire floor of the casino, consisting of a master bedroom, one smaller bedroom, a living room, kitchen and two bathrooms. Six quickly claimed the master bedroom with the en suite, while Veronica and Boone could fight over the smaller bedroom and the living room couches. Boone, careless as ever, ended up on the couch and he didn’t seem to complain – not that she had expected him too, he seldom said anything at all. Veronica however, had a mouth on her like few others. Deluded as she first had seemed, she was a smart girl, sensible even and good company, even though she continued to prattle on about some dress she wanted. ‘Never had fancy clothes down in the bunker, you know. I’ve always wanted one of those pre-war dresses made out of soft cotton or silk’, she said. Six guessed that if she was to find a fancy pre-war dress, New Vegas couldn’t have been a better place to look. 

After soaking in a tub for what felt like the first time of her life, Six thought about getting herself some rest in the unnaturally wide bed that was hers now, just enjoying the fact that she was clean, her long dark hair free from grime and desert dust and smelling of flowers instead of sweat and dirt. It had been a long time since she last had a look at herself in a mirror, the last time was at doc Mitchell’s when he had just patched her up. Now, the bullet-holes just behind her left temple was hardly visible and short dark hair had started growing out over it again, almost completely covering the silvery pink scar tissue. The wound in her side still hurt, but it had stayed free of infection and pus, other than that, she could only identify some smaller scars and bruises on her body. Except for some strange vertical scars on her lower abdomen, that she couldn’t identify. They were white and a bit silvery, not recent, it seemed. And as she stroked her hands over the back of her neck and her shoulders, she felt something just below her neck, where her spine began. She turned and tried to angle her body so that she could identify what was on her back, it was difficult but she soon realized she could angle the mirrors in the bathroom, making it easier for her to see what was there. 

_A brand_.  
A brand looking just like the red stamp on the receipt she’d found in Novac, telling of the sale of Boone’s wife and unborn child. It was a bull, the Legion’s bull – and below the bull was a number, which she read out to herself in whispers, duo milia ducenti sexaginta unus – and a month was written after the number that she guessed was a year, Junius. 2261, June – was it her date of birth? Below was the letters V.I, and first she read it as Six – her name? No, it couldn’t be the number six, it had to be letters, indicating something but she had no idea as to what they could indicate.   
She knew already that the Legion were slavers, could she have been a…slave? Was she really somehow associated to the Legion? The man she had been able to identify as her husband, was Legion – of higher rank as well, she guess from the way he commanded those men in Nipton – but what did that make her? Was everyone within the Legion branded for recognition, or was this a sign, showing that she was a slave? What did the V.I mean? Could it have something to do with her name, perhaps? Or someone she belonged to? 

Six touched the brand on her back, following it with her fingertips, shivering as she outlined the bull and then the numbers and letters. _‘Milia ducenti sexaginta unus’_ , she repeated to herself again, _‘That would make me…20 years old. Not implausible’_.   
It was a strange feeling, not recognizing the body in which you found yourself, having to trace your scars as if it was for the first time. For Six, it was the first time – sort of. She knew in the back of her minds that she had known the scars before, she had known her body before – but she didn’t know it now. She had cheated death and this was the price she paid, not knowing herself or who she was. She couldn’t decide if it was a curse or a blessing. Perhaps time would tell. 

The afternoon she had spent soaking in the bath had turned into evening when she laid down in her bed, crawling under the sheets. The soft and low humming of the air-conditioning keeping the suite cool from the Nevada heat made her somewhat uneasy, but she tried to ignore it. She could sleep through noise, natural made noise, not mechanical noise. Eventually she fell asleep despite the noise around her, the softness from the pre-war sheets and the cozy pillow beneath her head drowned her with comfort.

***

Six woke up with a start and what she saw before her in the darkness of her bedroom made her eyes wide with fear, but when she tried to scream, nothing came out. A hand muffled her noises and the man straddling her in the bed gestured for her to be quiet with a finger against his lips.  
As her eyes adjusted to the darkness surrounding her, she started to recognize the man – he wasn’t dressed in red armor with a skinned mutt’s head covering most of his features this time – instead he was wearing a pair of slim dark slacks and a white buttoned up shirt with rolled up sleeves. _Husband_.  
How had he gotten inside the 38? What and more specifically, who was he?

She tried to struggle from underneath him, she knew Boone was sleeping in the living room just outside, how had he been able to sneak past Boone? Six had tried to do just that herself, several times, but any kind of small movement would wake the sniper up. _Oh gods_ , Six thought to herself, _what if this man straddling her had killed Boone?_ The thought initially sparked anger within her and she pushed harder against the heavy body above her, but then fear caught her – and just then, he pressed his knees down over her arms and clutched his free hand around her throat, leaning down over her, whispering into her ear.   
“Quiet now, Aurelia. Don’t you recognize your own husband?” the same cold but softly tuned voice whispered in that strange language that came so naturally to her and the feeling of his breath lingering down her neck sent an unpleasant shiver down her spine. She supposed she didn’t need to answer, he knew that she knew. “It’s well past time for you to come home. Unfortunately, I can’t stay very long, my love, but know that I am watching you. You should know that I have eyes and ears all over the Mojave, you simply cannot escape me this time”   
He removed his hand from her mouth and kissed her, forcing her lips apart with his own, biting down on her lower lip making her taste the coppery blood springing from the violation. His lips felt dry but at the same time warm and somehow, she was flooded with feelings of comfort and safety, however, the feeling of fear still festered inside her. It was a dual experience, the feeling of comfort but at the same time fear – somehow it made her think of a home she couldn’t imagine. And _Aurelia_ , he had called her, was that her name? Aurelia. It didn’t necessarily feel right, but at least it was a name, unlike Six, which was just a number – a number she’d been given that led to her almost dying.   
She was drawn away from her thoughts by his tongue making its way into her mouth and without even thinking about it, her own met his and she parted her lips further, meeting him in the deep kiss. The feeling of his soft, warm tongue filled her with a lust she hadn’t felt before and she wanted more. An intense feeling of want, sparked by equal amounts of fear and excitement, comfort and the closeness of his warm skin, dry thin lips and the hard grips of his hand had her letting out a moan. It was completely unconscious, but something about him was doing things to her, things that felt so natural and obvious, self-explanatory. A hand gripped her hair and suddenly, he was beside her, gripping her cheek with his other hand, drawing her close to him.   
“So you haven’t forgotten me, have you?” he whispered between the kisses, locking his eyes with hers completely, “You should be thankful I love my wife, I could easily have you killed for what you’ve put me through, you whore” he snarled under his breath and tugged her head back with the grip in her hair.   
He pushed her so she lay with her back to him, still gripping her hair tightly, but one of his hands snaked up between her thighs and she chocked back a gasp. She heard him chuckle lightly against the nape of her neck as he parted the lips of her sex and stroked her. “You always enjoyed when I treated you a little rough, seems that hasn’t changed, has it?” he nuzzled her lobe as he whispered to her. “Don’t make any noise now, my love, or I will have to kill you” 

He unbuttoned his slacks and pulled down the zip, releasing himself, stroking his length for a few seconds, before pulling up her nightdress and forcing himself inside her as his hand closed around her throat. Six moaned silently, feeling completely helpless within his grip, a good helplessness – a very familiar and enjoyable helplessness. His hot breath made her skin prickle as he thrust into her, pinning her deeper down into the mattress with every push, whispering threats mixed with sweet words in that oh so naturally flowing but strange tongue. After only a few minutes of intense, deep manhandling he bit into her shoulder and released himself inside her, jerking erratically against her – every muscle in his body tensing. 

Before he snuck out of her bedroom, he reminded her that she was being watched and he made sure she knew her place in relation to him; “You are coming home with me, Aurelia – I do not take no for an answer, especially not when it concerns my wife, _my property_ ”.

***

The day after her husbands visit to her suite, she felt sore and paranoid as she walked the strip with a very much living Boone beside her, trying to take all the lights, all the people and the different noises in. She decided she couldn’t walk around like a scared hare, jumping at every noise around her – it was obvious she was important to the legionary that was her husband, but he had made it completely clear that he would and could hurt her, if he wanted to.  
When she neared the large complex just beyond the walls behind the Ultra Luxe, which she later identified as the NCR embassy, she was met by the large printed image of her husband. The painted resemblance was uncanny, with his prominent cheekbones and the dog’s head obscuring his own head – from last night, she had learned his hair was dark, darker than her own and he wore it pulled back, but strands of hair fell into his face when he leaned forward. His eyes were lightly steel blue, almost icy in the light flowing inside her bedroom from the moon and from down the Strip. You couldn’t see his eyes in the poster, since he wore the same road goggles on the picture as he had been wearing when she first encountered him in Nipton. His skin in the poster was darker than it was in reality, he really was quite pale for someone spending such a large amount of time roaming the desert – but so was she, so she supposed it wasn’t unnatural.  
‘ _When you steal NCR equipment, tools, and personal property… YOU ARE HIS BITCH_ ’ the poster read.  
“Who is that?” Six pointed at her husband on the poster.  
“What? You don’t know?” Boone answered with a surprised grunt.  
“Dude, I was shot in the head, you know I have trouble remembering things”, Six retorted, looking at the smoking sniper standing just to her right.  
“If there’s a devil, that’s him”, Boone said with a lower voice.  
“Devil? What’s a devil?”  
“Seriously?” he grunted and sighed loudly. “Where the fuck are you from? Who doesn’t know what a devil is?”  
“Boone, just tell me his name, please?”  
Boone moaned in annoyance and with the worst possible pronunciation he uttered the name of her husband, “Vulpes Inculta”  
Six nodded and looked back up at the poster. Vulpes Inculta, V.I. That’s what the brand on her back meant – it told of whom she belonged to. With her husbands words from last night freshly in her mind, she didn’t know if she was to laugh or cry.

***


	4. MMCCLXXVI

_5 years earlier, Flagstaff_

She hadn’t even been married to the decanus for a year, before she was being dragged by legionary guards to the large arena in the center of the capital of Caesar’s lands, to watch her husband become flagellated and then crucified until his death for disobeying orders.   
One of their slaves had come running just moments before, having been down the market shopping for vegetables, milk and other necessities for the household. The skinny woman shouted for her mistress, “Domina, domina Aurelia!” as she ran up the hill to the bungalow in which Aurelia resided with her husband, the Legion decanus, then only known as Vulpes. The slave tried to calm herself down, explaining as best she could what she had seen down in the market place. The troops led by the centurion Marcus Decimus had marched through the market, towards the large arena with Aurelia’s husband dragged in chains behind them. He had been stripped of his weapons and armor, but according to the slave, he smiled as he was being dragged behind the other legionaries. A few minutes later, the guards marched into her home and without a word, grabbed a hold of her shoulders and hauled her out into the blazing sun and down the slope of the hill towards the city center and the large arena. 

Aurelia had to fight to hold her tears back as she watched her husband’s back spring open from every lash of the whip, tearing into his skin. His commander, the centurion was the one holding the whip – as was custom – and after ten strikes of the capped whip, the centurion was covered in sprays of blood while Vulpes stood chained to the pole, with his arms stretched up, chained together and hooked to the pole. He was completely naked, stripped of everything, even his boots and the whip continued to slash over his shoulders, his back and his legs. You’d think that the pain you suffered from being flagellated would have you screaming like a piglet, writhing in pain with tears flowing down your cheeks. That would be the natural response to such a harsh treatment, however, her husband didn’t cry, he didn’t shout or scream in pain. Instead, just as the slave had described, he smiled. He stared up into the sky, mumbling something to himself, perhaps praying, Aurelia thought, but keeping the smile upon his lips as the whip worked the back of his body more and more open.   
The crowd that had gathered in the arena cheered, as enjoyment was the general response of a lower ranked legionary being publically punished – just as with the great games that were being held every mid solace in the arena. Aurelia, however, didn’t cheer, she couldn’t move a muscle in her face – because if she did, the tears would start falling. She hadn’t planned on loving the man being whipped down below, when her father sold her to the decanus for marriage. But she had fallen in love with him, he was intelligent and exciting, well read and when he was in a good mood, he treated her like she was the most precious thing to him. The thought of their evening ritual, when he was home from the raids against local tribes in the south of Arizona, made her stomach ache and it felt as if her heart was going to burst. He used to brush her long hair for her – sending the slaves away – and he took great care to not hurt her while he worked through the thick waves and curls of her dark hair, flowing down to the small of her back. Then he would braid it for her and tie the braid up with a small leather band, so it would keep during the night.

Aurelia searched the crowd around her and the other side of the arena and after a while, she saw her father – or the man she knew as her father, but who she didn’t rightfully know, as she had never actually spoken more than one full sentence to him in all her life. Aurelius of Phoenix, also a centurion. He stood on the other side of the arena, watching the spectacle with his arms crossed over his chest. Why didn’t he do anything? What could Vulpes have done to deserve such a punishment?   
She tried to wrestle her way out of the guard’s hands, but to little avail – it only earned her a smack over the face and a grunt from one of the guards that she should know her place. She knew her place, all right – but she didn’t agree that her place was up here, watching her husband from afar, suffering with his blood trickling down from the raw gashes on his back. He was going to bleed to death if someone didn’t put a stop to this madness at once!  
“Stop!” she screamed, “Father, please, make him stop!” Aurelia shouted, trying to gain her father’s attention. Aurelius looked up at her with a sardonic expression on his face and she knew he wasn’t going to interfere. “He’s going to kill him! Please, stop! For the love of Mars, please, please…” her voice became strained and raspy as she sobbed while trying to get enough air down her lungs.   
“Calm yourself, woman”, one of the guards holding her in place snarled and tugged at her shoulder. “It’s too late, he’s getting the cross”   
“No! No, they can’t!” Aurelia sobbed, still without letting the tears filling her eyes spill over and run down her cheeks. “What did he do? Please, tell me, what did my husband do?”   
“I told you to keep calm!” the same guard who had told her off before, told her again and backhanded her.   
“Hey, Crispus, take it easy”, the other guard said to his friend, “The decanus disobeyed orders, he knew exactly what would happen if he did. He brought this on himself” 

Aurelia was lost for words. Why would Vulpes disobey his centurion’s orders? It was obviously something that was not right about the whole thing, Vulpes was intelligent, quite possibly the smartest person she had ever met. And he didn’t have a death wish, so why would he even try to pull of something so careless as obliviously disobeying his commanding centurion?   
She watched her husband receive his 35th lash, he was to receive 40 before they lashed him to a cross to let him rot in the sun. His knees had given in and he was now hanging from his arms, drooling blood with his head still watching the heavens. His thin lips were still moving silently, slowly in prayer, with his eyes half lidded – but he kept the smile on his lips. That cunning, almost arrogant thin smile that usually looked menacingly vicious with his icy penetrating eyes. Those eyes that had her flinching for the first weeks after he had purchased her, when he had her chained to the bed in their bungalow just waiting for him to ravish her. But he never did. It had startled her, the fact that he brought her up to his bed and letting her sleep beside him during the night, but never actually doing anything to her. He simply lay there besides her, sleeping. She would learn later, why Vulpes didn’t touch her the first few weeks, and it would scare her more than anything had ever scared her before in her entire life, at that point.

***

“Stop this at once!” a deep, strong voice sounded over the arena. Every head turned over to see the Malpais Legate enter behind the centurion extracting the punishment on his decanus. The Legate was easily recognizable in his jeans and white shirt. He usually wore a bullet proof vest over the shirt, but Aurelia had seen him a few times without it and guessed that he only wore it when there was an actual threat to his person, _which would all the time_ , she thought. But apparently not. He never wore the armor of the Legion, he was actually the only one who never did and his vexed Aurelia – because he was a Legate, not some kind of spy needing to dress in profligate clothing to hide his identity. She had asked Vulpes about it, but he hadn’t answered, at least not more than giving her a shrug and then leaving the room.

A small argument seemed to break out down in the arena as the centurion argued for his right to punish the disobeying decanus, but the Legate was insistent on stopping the punishment. Neither Aurelia nor her guards could hear what was being said, but eventually two praetorian guards came running into the arena and unchained Vulpes, covering him in a blanket and leading him out. Aurelia didn’t know what to think, she felt a panic build up within her as she saw before her how he got strung up on a cross and there was nothing she could do. But why had the Legate interrupted the punishment? What reason could he have for saving Vulpes, if that is what he was doing? 

It took several hours before Aurelia was notified of her husband’s condition, she had been taken home by her two guards, kicking and screaming, trying to claw her way out of their grips – she had known it would do little to improve her situation, but she didn’t care. Without Vulpes, she was worthless, without him, she would be handed back to her father. Her cannibalistic father who had killed her mother and also possibly eaten her afterwards. Without Vulpes, she might as well die, because the truth was, that even though he owned her, she loved him. He made sure she was being educated, he allowed for her to learn how to defend herself, how to use weapons and that gave her a freedom she’d never before imagined.   
When a praetorian guard along with one of Caesar’s slaves came to the bungalow upon the hillside of west Flagstaff, Aurelia rushed to the door. She was escorted into the city center again, but this time the guard took her to the Medicinae Centrum Imperatoria. The medical center was a large pre-war building that had been restored to function as a Legion Hospital, mostly handling wounded legionaries, but also taking care of the citizens of Flagstaff and those who came from other parts of Caesar’s lands in need of medical treatment. It was also here that they had Legion researchers working on developing more advanced healing methods and other such things. 

After being led through large halls and up four cases of stairs by a medical slave, she was finally led into a separate room with several cots in it. The incense of burning sage was heavy the air – the slave told her it had a calming effect on those in pain and sped up the healing process within the flesh. On a cot in the middle of the room, lay Vulpes on his stomach. He was silent, but obviously awake – his back looked horrible. He had been lashed 37 times before the Legate had interrupted the punishment. He had cuts all the way from his shins, over the back of his thighs, over his entire back and shoulders. The worst gash tore his back open and had had to be stitched together. The others had been treated with healing powder, which was a crude, but quite helpful method, as far as Aurelia knew. It hurt intensely, she knew from her own experience, after having cut her hand open when peeling potatoes half a year back. She didn’t even want to imagine the pain Vulpes endured as he laid there on his stomach – and all he could possibly do was to wait for his body to heal and pray to the gods that the wounds wouldn’t suffer too much from infection. 

“Would you please leave us?” Aurelia asked the medical slave that had accompanied her.   
“Of course”, the slave nodded and walked out, leaving Aurelia alone with her husband in the dimly lit room. They had electricity in Flagstaff, but it was used sparsely to conserve recourses and therefore the only light in the room came from an oil-lamp.   
Aurelia hurried to her husband and dropped down on her knees at his side, “My love”, she whispered and took his hand, leaning down and kissing his knuckles. “Is there anything I can do?”   
“You can sit down with me”, Vulpes answered in a low but even voice. “Keep me company”   
“Of course, my love. But are you thirsty? Please, if there’s anything you need, tell me”, Aurelia sat down beside him and leaned against the wall, stroking his cheek and holding his hand.   
“Nothing right now, Lupa”, he smirked and Aurelia’s mouth curved upwards in a smile as he glanced up at her from where he laid. 

She spent the night sitting by her husband’s side, watching over him and fetching water for him. In the morning a slave came with breakfast for them both and they ate together, Aurelia sitting on the floor beside Vulpes. He was in a good mood, considering the state of his back, but he had every reason to be in a good mood and so did Aurelia. Her worries about her husband’s health aside, they had more cause for celebration than for mourning the public punishment and humiliation. Vulpes had been promoted to a Frumentarius. Caesar had seen his potential when it came to unconventional warfare and decided he would be rewarded by focusing completely on infiltration. From that public humiliation, Vulpes started his climbing within the ranks of the Legion and he soon became one of Caesar’s favorites.

***

To claim that Vulpes never laid a hand on Aurelia, would be to lie. He did lay hand on her, but only when necessary. It was nothing strange and many a men had beaten Aurelia since she was a child, the difference with Vulpes was that he only did it when he felt it absolutely necessary – and during copulation. But during intercourse, it wasn’t as much beatings, as it was hard grips, pulling of hair and forcefulness from his side.  
During the vast majority of the time, her husband was calm and collected, with a complete control of his temper and behavior. But every now and again, as if after a schedule, he went completely mad, loosing all control of his senses and behaved in a completely maniacal way. Except towards Aurelia.

She didn’t know this at first and when she went to one of the other female slaves, she had been living with Vulpes for just a few weeks, to ask if she was doing something wrong, as he hadn’t even tried to touch her in a intimate way. The woman had laughed at Aurelia, asking her if she’d grown up behind a shed somewhere in the desert and well, truth was, she pretty much had. She had grown up in Flagstaff, within the confines of her father’s estate on the north side of the capital and had seldom been outside of the villa’s gates – living amongst her fathers other slaves in the small ‘condos’ beside his villa. Many of the other slaves thought that since she was the daughter of a centurion, she’d had special privileges growing up, but it had been quite the contrary. Her father was a sadistic tyrant, known for being a sick bastard who preferred girls a bit too young for both Caesar and the Legate to be completely comfortable with it. He had however, never touched Aurelia – he had hardly even recognized her existence, until a decanus had visited his villa one evening for a celebration of the capture of a large tribe by the joint forces of Aurelius of Phoenix and Marcus Decimus. That’s how she ended up married to Vulpes. 

“He turns into a monster, a complete fucking murderous lunatic – killing anything female that comes in his way. Hell, Caesar even plans some raids after Vulpes’ ‘maniacal fits’”, the woman told her in a hushed voice.   
“Wh…What?” Aurelia answered with eyes wide with fear, “How often does this happen?”   
“Once or twice every six months or so”   
“But, but what do you do when he becomes like that?”  
“Uh, what do you think? We fucking hide, is what we do”, the woman almost spat, rolling her eyes to Aurelia.   
“Doesn’t he find you? Everyone can’t possibly hide, can they?”   
“Of course not, he’ll find a few slaves and hopefully you’re able to hide long enough for him to become sated on what he finds, until next time”

Aurelia was completely stunned, just staring at the woman standing closely beside her. Her head felt completely empty and she noticed she was shaking, having trouble breathing consistently. “But…You say Caesar plans raids after his ‘fits’, then there must be some signs that they’re coming, right?” she asked the woman.   
“Yeah, sure. They say that he get’s real fucking happy, like psychotic happy. Like he’s high or something and then a day or two later, he just snaps” the woman says, snapping a small branch with her hands as if to increase the dramatic effect.   
“Shit”, Aurelia gulped.   
“Uh huh, that’s putting it mildly, girl. You should’ve stayed with your cannibalistic father – Vulpes’ the worst of them all”  
“It’s not like I had a choice, none of us do”   
“Truer words haven’t been spoken. Now, run along and enjoy your marriage while it lasts. You have about two weeks, if I’m not mistaken” 

The days went on and even though Aurelia wished she could make the time slow down or even stop through sheer power of will, it never worked and during a dies Saturni evening, after Vulpes had spent the entire day and the day before being in an unusually good mood – the snap came. Aurelia hadn’t known before what she was going to do and she certainly didn’t know then. They had been married a week earlier, which consisted of having a prayer read over them by a priestess in the temple. It was after the wedding ceremony that he had been intimate with her for the first time and he hadn’t ravished her, exactly. She couldn’t tell whether he was gentle or not, she had nothing to compare it to, but it had been a drawn out thing and afterwards, she was sore all over. The third time around, she had started to enjoy it, learning to relax into his movements and letting him do what he thought was best. He was considerate of her, wanting her to be willing and he had spent a long time after his ejaculation, kissing her bruises and sore spots. 

That was why it surprised Aurelia when she could actually witness the ‘snap’ happening inside her husbands mind. He was usually rather stoic and if he was in a good mood, he carried a small arrogant smirk on his face, looking smug in a surly way that was hard to describe without contradicting yourself. She learned quite quickly that he was an exceptionally handsome man and many of the female slaves more or less fawned over him. When he snapped, however, it was as if every expression in his face intensified and his eyes almost turned glowing, eyes widening and his pupils becoming large and then shrinking quickly into tiny but piercing dots and his breathing all of a sudden became heavier.   
Aurelia was scrubbing a pot when it happened and when she saw the change in her husband, she dropped the pot, realizing what had just occurred with full panic pounding in her chest and her mind telling her to run the fuck away. The pot that was made of clay crashed into the ground and immediately, Vulpes attention was fully on her, his eyes piercing her every fiber.   
He looked completely homicidal, standing in their kitchen in his red tunic and boots, his shoulders heaving along with his heavy breathing and his eyes nailed on Aurelia, who stood in a corner, shaking. When he moved towards her, she gave out a pathetic little yelp, stretching her arms out trying to protect herself from what would undoubtedly be the last person she ever saw in her pointless existence. Vulpes bent her arms down to her sides and closed his arms around her, gripping her neck tightly with one of his calloused hands.

“I would never hurt you without reason, do you understand me, Aurelia?” he told her through clenched jaws. His voice was still the same cold, melodious voice, but it sounded strained, like he was trying to retain some control over himself that was weakening for every second that ticked by.  
“Yes, husband”, Aurelia stammered out with a frightened gasp.  
Then he let her go and marched out of the house. Aurelia hurried after him but stopped at the door, watching him leave. He encountered the first unfortunate slave just outside their house and he grabbed her by her hair, pulling her kicking and screaming behind him before beating her to death in the middle of the street. Before he was finished with her, he prompted her head up on the sidewalk, stomping down on her with the sole of his boot, cracking the entire skull against the pavement. He stopped for a moment to inspect his first victim and as he wiped the blood spatter off his face with his arm, Aurelia could see him laughing silently to himself.

***

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, an unpleasant reference to a great movie there at the end.


	5. Under Your Spell

Her name was Aurelia, she was most likely 20 years old and her mother tongues were the common language and something Arcade, the Freeside doc called ‘Latin’. She could switch between the two languages without thinking, but she also knew exactly when she did. Her accent was slightly different from the accent they spoke here in New Vegas, but it wasn’t far off, Veronica had told her, that she sounded more like an Arizonian tribal, than someone from Nevada. What that meant, she found out as soon as she could hear Boones groan beside her. “That’s Legion land, isn’t it?” the sniper grunted and Veronica nodded silently. She also knew that she was a slave and she was a married woman. Married to someone they called the ‘Monster of the Mojave’ and whose face decorated NCR’s anti-Legion propaganda.   
Because Six felt so conflicted about her feelings towards Vulpes, she decided to leave out the part about being married and to whom, when she spoke of what she had been able to gather about her past.   
“So, if you’re from Legion-controlled lands, why do you think you left?” Veronica asked as all three of them had sat down in the living room at the Lucky 38.   
“I think”, Six began speaking, looking first at Veronica and then back at Boone, “I was a slave. I’ve found this brand on the back of my neck”   
“What?” Boone spat while Veronica gasped, the sniper turned towards Six, eying her up and down behind his shades.

Six turned her back towards them and pulled up her t-shirt, showing both Veronica and Boone the brand of the Legion’s bull between her shoulders. Boone became so angry he smashed his wrist into the table and darted up from the couch, leaving Six and Veronica equally surprised.   
“I’m sorry Six”, Veronica said in a soft voice. “Is there anything else you remember?”   
“I can speak Latin, obviously. I learned that fact at the Old Mormon Fort when Arcade was patching me up. He mumbled something in Latin and I answered without thinking, in Latin. The numbers on my back, below the bull, probably tells of when I was born – so I suppose I’m 20 years old”   
“That makes sense”, Veronica nodded carefully, stroking Six’s arm. “You still don’t remember your real name?”   
“No, I don’t think so”, Six decided not to tell them. She had no idea what her name could mean in NCR territory, or anywhere else. She only knew that it was what Vulpes called her the night he came to visit her. It had been a week since then and she hadn’t seen him in the 38, or anywhere else on the Strip or around New Vegas. But she could feel eyes on her, even though she tried her best to ignore them. Sometimes it was the eyes of innocents, just curious as to whom the girl with the long dark hair and the Stetson was, other times, the eyes were more insidious. 

Mr. House was growing impatient with her inactivity and it had become time to pay Benny a visit at the Tops Casino. She had tried to put it off, concerned about what she was going to have to do once she was there. _By any means necessary_ , Mr. House had said.   
Six couldn’t claim to feel any sort of loyalty towards her husband at the moment, at least not any loyalty that wasn’t purely based on emotions she couldn’t decipher properly – rationally, she was just confused. She was paranoid, scared that he would hurt her if she only took one misplaced step that displeased him, at the same time, she felt pressured by Mr. House. Strangely enough, she wanted to speak to Vulpes, seek him out for counsel on how to handle the situation. Something deep inside her told her that he would know. He would know even more so than Veronica or Boone. Perhaps Arcade would know, he was intellectual and seemed to be well read. But she had no idea how to approach Arcade considering what Mr. House wanted her to do, considering what Mr. House had insinuated. But why did she feel like Vulpes would know? Would it really be the right thing, seeking him out – seeking out the Legion, the very fraction in the Mojave she had run away from. Why had she run? Was it because she was a slave? 

Six was feeling tired of not knowing, she felt tired of being so conflicted and her gut telling her something, but her mind telling her otherwise. Something about it wasn’t right. _Two wrong’s doesn’t make a right_ , echoed inside her mind.   
“Unfair thinking!” Six snarled to herself as she rooted around the dresser in her bedroom, looking for a modest but nice looking dress to make her look more like any kind of civilian.   
She found a midnight blue dress with a pencil-skirt that ended just below her knees and covered the upper part of her arms, as well as not showing off too much of her cleavage. The dress was just slightly too large, but as she looked at herself in the mirror, she thought that she filled it out nicely. If nothing else, it made the dress look more modest, than if it had clinched her round hips tighter than it already did. She fastened a thin black belt she found hanging in the wardrobe around her waist to mark it, just as she had seen in the pre-war magazines that littered the wasteland. It took her some time to find a pair of heels that fitted both her feet and her dress, that weren’t too high, since she’d never used heels before – at least they didn’t feel familiar on her feet and she had too walk around in them for a while to get the hang of it.   
Fixing her long hair was easier, somehow her hands seemed to just know how to pull it up, curl it between her fingers and fasten it with bobby pins. Eventually she looked almost civil in her dress and as she walked out to Veronica, the scribe’s eyes widened.   
“Oh gosh, you look absolutely gorgeous Six!” he squealed with excitement, eying Six from top to bottom, “Who would’ve thought you had it in you? From now on, you may never wear that stupid hat again!”   
“What? I love that hat…It’s very practical”, Six crossed her arms over her chest, pouting.   
“Speaking of practicality, you’re heading to the Tops, aren’t you?” Veronica looked her over again.   
“Yeah, that’s the thought”   
“You armed?”   
“Oh shit, forgot about that”   
“I bet you could beat him to death with your fists, but I think you should at least have some small weapon with you, you know, to help you even out the odds if nothing else”, Veronica smirked.   
“You’re right, of course”, Six nodded and went back into her bedroom. 

She needed something small enough to conceal it on her body, but deadly enough to kill an attacker – something that she could easily reach if she needed to. Well, her caravan shotgun was out, so was the machete she had stolen from a dead legionary. But she had her combat knife, it wasn’t a toothpick, but not far from it. She could strap it to the inside of her thigh and hope the thugs padding down people when entering the Tops wouldn’t be shameless enough to pad her between her legs. If they would, she could always try to distract them somehow.   
… _Or you could try finding your husband and ask him for advice_ , her mind mused. Her stomach said ‘yes’, but her rationality said she could do this herself, without involving a possessive psychopath. Well, she didn’t know if he actually was a psychopath, but he crucified people for a living. That’s what psychopath's do, right?

***

Six had hardly dared to step outside the Lucky 38 during the evenings, there was something so strange about how the city transformed from the bleak and dusty collection of buildings, to a mirage of blinking light bulbs, neon lights and drunkards. Six didn’t like the drunks, something about them made her extremely uneasy, their staggering walk and spluttering speech. She could sometimes during the evenings hear the brawls going on between drunken soldiers, gamblers and hussies outside the doors of the 38 and it made her feel physically ill. New Vegas was a nest of… _degenerates_ , that was the word. Wasn’t that the word Vulpes had used when she met him in Nipton? Damn it, she really was one of Caesar’s women, wasn’t she?

Well, she didn’t mind the lights, at least. They were beautiful and fascinating, glimmering and blinking in tune with the different music playing from the casinos, restaurants and bars around the Strip.   
Where could she find Vulpes? She thought as she looked around her. Straight across the street was Gomorrah, was that a suitable place for a high ranking legionary? She really had no idea. She decided to delay her visit to Gomorrah for a while and walked through the gates that led her into the part of the Strip were she could find the Tops and the Ultra-Luxe and she decided to walk towards the Ultra-Luxe, leaving it up to chance. She wasn’t exactly in a hurry – New Vegas was an around the clock-town and it was only during the early hours of the morning that the important people went to sleep. 

Six was escorted inside the foyer of the Ultra-Luxe by the doorman who had inspected her from top to bottom before letting her in, apparently she looked good enough to be allowed into their fancy establishment. The foyer was an amazing looking hall with a high ceiling, the walls covered in teak wood panels and in the middle of the ceiling hung a huge chandelier. Further inside, a woman stood behind a large reception and Six walked towards her, smiling.   
“Welcome to the Ultra-Luxe. I do hope it exceeds your every expectation”, the woman behind the counter smiled towards her. The smile looked strained and her eyes absolutely did _not_ smile, Six chose to ignore that and curled her lips upwards, putting on her most charming face.   
“It certainly does”, Six smiled.   
“How may I help you this evening, Mrs.?”

‘Do I even have a surname?’ Six asked in her mind, cursing herself for not thinking of this earlier. Of course a normal person would have a surname, a completely normal NCR citizen who’s not really the runaway bride of one of Caesar’s commanders.   
“Fox”, a by now very familiar voice rang through the room with its velvety tone, sounding far more charming than Six had heard it before. “Marjorie, I understand you haven’t had the pleasure of meeting my wife, Annie”, Vulpes walked up to the reception and snaked his arm around Six’s waist.   
“I have not, a pleasure, Mrs. Fox”, Marjorie nodded with a small smile.   
“There you are, dear. I was hoping I would find you here”, Six kept smiling and cast a glance up at Vulpes, kissing him lightly on the cheek.   
“Indeed”, Vulpes smirked in a way that made him look incredibly smug. “Come on, honey”, he said and patted her on the small of her back, telling her to start walking.   
“A good evening to you, Mr. and Mrs. Fox”, Marjorie said.   
“And you as well”, Vulpes nodded back to the receptionist. 

Vulpes led her over to the elevators and while they waited for the elevator to arrive, none of them said anything. Vulpes looked like any other gambler in his slim black suit and fedora. Though, he really was a good-looking man, for being someone that tortures people in his spare time, that is. As they waited, Six noticed a man and two women standing in the corner a few feet away from her and Vulpes and both women were eying her with what she could only interpret as jealousy. Vulpes however, kept his eyes on her completely and when the elevator bell pinged and they entered it, his arm was around her waist again.   
“Why are you here, Aurelia?” Vulpes asked as soon as the doors closed.   
“I needed to find you, this was my first stop. Seems I was rather lucky”, Six looked up into his eyes.   
“Or unlucky, depending on who you ask”, Vulpes looked amused, curling one side of his mouth upwards.   
“Seeing as I am still your wife and the fact that I’m coming to you willingly, I would hope you’d refrain from killing me”, Six said, looking less amused.   
Vulpes snorted, looking almost indignant, “Believe me, Aurelia, the last person I wish to harm is the mother of my son”   
“Wait, what?!” Six looked at Vulpes with wide eyes, her head suddenly felt dizzy and she had to grab on to the closest stable thing, which unfortunately was her husband. “My…son?” Six had to force herself to take deep breaths, not allowing the panic to pollute her mind.   
“Yes, _our_ son. I only have the one and you’re his mother, as you’re very well aware”, Vulpes looked down on her with piercing eyes.   
By the gods, was she thick! Of course that’s what the scars on her stomach was – she had been pregnant. How could she not have understood that right away? There was a child somewhere out there, _her child_.   
“Where is he?” Six almost snarled, “Have you hurt him? Have you done something to him? Is that why you’re here, to taunt me?”   
“Why would I hurt our son, Aurelia? And you’re the one who came here, you’ve been away for two years, without a word-“, the elevator pinged and the doors opened. “Come on, wife”, Vulpes said between his teeth and led her in a determined grasp around her arm, obviously annoyed not only from the way the topic had turned, but also by the fact that he was interrupted. _He doesn’t like being interrupted_ , something inside her mused. 

The suite Six was being brought into was lavish in a way her suite at the 38 wasn’t, sure, it was smaller, she had an entire floor, but not to herself. She did not know if Vulpes stayed here by himself – but she could only see one bed peaking through the doors that obviously contained the bedroom. The room was decorated with gold, light silk and the wallpaper was light with silvery hints that gleamed in the light from several small electric lamps placed here and there in the room. In the middle was a large group of couches and armchairs and to her direct right was a smaller bar, brimmed with brass and gold-looking metal. 

Vulpes tugged her arm, pushing her against the wall, “Why, Aurelia, would I hurt our son?”   
“I…I don’t know! You’ve threatened to kill me and now you tell me we have a son. What am I suppose to think?”   
Vulpes frowned deeply, searching her with his eyes. He grabbed her chin and started looking around her forehead and temples, pulling her hair back and searching her scalp. “Yes, of course”, he hummed.   
“What are you doing?” Six spat.   
“You were shot, almost killed. What kind of consequences have you experienced since you woke up?”   
“Isn’t it obvious?”   
“No, it is not”, Vulpes’ lips twitched as he looked her in the eye. “Tell me, now”   
“I can’t…I can’t remember anything from before”   
“Before? Before that bastard chairman put a bullet in your skull?”   
Six nodded stiffly in response.   
“I’m going to fucking kill him”, Vulpes spat, his eyes widening in an unbelievably hostile way, making him look almost mad. “I’m going to flay that fucking cunt alive, give him to the mongrels and when the profligate degenerate is half eaten but still alive, I will crucify him”   
“By Mars, Vulpes, calm down”, Six was now pressing herself up against the wall, Vulpes had drawn away from her, pacing around the room with balled up fists, turning his knuckles white with tension.   
“Calm down? Do you understand what the fuck you have done, you stupid belligerent whore?” Vulpes’ hand was around her throat before she even had time to react.   
“Belligerent? You’re the one who’s shouting and trying to strangle me, threatening me!” Six tried to squirm her way out of his hands, kicking at his shins.   
“You left! You ran away”, Vulpes pressed one finger into her cheek every time he mentioned ‘you’, “You abandoned our son! You stayed away for two years without a word! You humiliated me! And look were you’ve put us now, in the middle of a fucking power struggle in New Vegas, and you could have fucking gotten yourself killed, you stupid masochistic cunt!   
“What’s wrong with you, Aurelia? Huh? And now, now I can’t even be truly angry at you for being such a stupid, audacious whore – because you got shot in the fucking head! If you can’t even remember our son, I mean – come on, where do I even begin?”   
“I’m sorry, Vulpes”, Six gasped, holding down a sob. “I don’t really know why I left, what happened or why I would even leave our son. I don’t know, I just don’t know” 

Vulpes let go of her throat and just stared at her, looking completely emptied, weary, breathing heavily, his shoulders going up and down.   
“I tried, Aurelia, tried to be a good husband to you. I took you away from your degenerate father, provided you with a good life. I didn’t treat you like the other slaves, I’ve always treated you as a wife”  
“I can’t remember”, Six shook her head, rubbing her forehead.   
“You just fucking ran – and I understand, the life I provided you with in Flagstaff and later at the Fort, it wasn’t enough. But you cannot do that, you’re not a profligate – you’re a woman under the reign of Caesar, the daughter of a centurion, you have a duty”   
“I’m so confused, Vulpes. I feel so fucking conflicted and this is not helping”, for the first time since Six woke up, she felt tears streaming down her cheeks. Seeing her husband so upset, so…emotionally broken, stirred something within her. It didn’t feel like he was supposed to ever look this hurt, this torn.   
“You have to come home with me, Aurelia. By Mars, be the mother you’re supposed to be. Atticus needs his mother”, Vulpes closed in on her again, grabbing her upper arms, looking into her eyes, “I’m not whole without you”   
“I…I don’t know Vulpes”, Six searched her husbands face, “What about Benny?”  
“What about him?” Vulpes caressed her cheeks, “I’ll kill him. It’s my duty as your husband, why?”   
“He’s got the Platinum Chip, Mr. House wants it, he…He wants me to get if for him”   
“I’ll get it done, my love. Whatever Mr. House told you to do, I’ll make sure it’s done. Yes?”   
Six nodded, looking down on her hands. “That’s…Why I came to you, you know. I needed advice. I didn’t know what I was supposed to do. I couldn’t speak to Veronica or Boone…They wouldn’t have understood”  
“They wouldn’t have understood what?” Vulpes arched an eyebrow, looking down at Six, gently stroking the nape of her neck.   
“Mr. House…He told me to get the chip, _by any means necessary_ ”  
Vulpes' lips twitched and she could almost see a snarl forming as he drew back his lips, showing his teeth like the fox he truly was. But then he suddenly switched it off and straightened up, his face changing from hostile to emotionless.   
“Don’t worry about it, Aurelia”, he said and leaned in and kissed her.

***

It had been a complete surprise seeing Aurelia in the foyer at the Ultra-Luxe and as soon as he moved closer, Vulpes saw Alerio nodding towards him. He was obviously on his way to tell Vulpes that the Courier had entered the casino. Fortunately, Vulpes had caught her just in the right moment, actually saving her from that tiresome bitch Marjorie. Caesar had made a deal with the cannibals of the White Glove Society, but his dear she-wolf couldn’t know that, could she? He would have hated having his wife served up at tomorrow’s dinner and so he thanked the gods he’d spotted her when he did. And for once on the Strip, he didn’t even have to spurt a lie – Annie Fox was indeed is wife.

The fight that occurred in his suite, that had its starting point in the elevator up, was the most intense fight they’ve ever had. Aurelia was never timid, in anyway, but she used to know her place – when to talk and when to keep quiet. It was unfortunate she had woken up with the profligates after being shot, otherwise he could have made her completely pliant immediately. Now, it was going to require quite a lot of work from him, but it was all right, she was, after all, not just any slave.   
A good thing about her getting shot and loosing her memory, was the fact that she’d obviously forgotten what a good actor he was. Did she even know what he actually did for a living? Except putting degenerates on crosses, naturally. Possibly not, else she wouldn’t have trusted him so blindly. She used to be smarter than that, but then again, she used to know him better. It did however, surprise him that she didn’t seemed to know that he was the highest ranking spy within the Legion. His very work was based on deception and lies – and she had played right into his hand. He had been able to scare her enough to keep her wary, but he had been gentle enough in his kisses, possessive enough in his love making and then emotionally fragile enough for her to believe him. The way she looked at him just now, he could have her eating out of his hand in less time he had originally thought possible. He would certainly use this, however, it occurred to him that he needed his wife to be able to get to Mr. House.   
Vulpes had received word from Caesar about doing everything in his power to eliminate Mr. House and he wouldn’t be able to get into Lucky 38 without Aurelia. As much as he wanted to have her taken back to the Fort, they at least needed to get a hold of the chip before anything else. 

“Aurelia”, Vulpes went to sit down beside his wife in the couch were she was waiting for him to say or do something.   
“Yes?” she answered, looking at him.   
“Did Mr. House tell you anything about what the chip does?”   
“No. I was only supposed to deliver it, he wants me to finish my job. That’s it”   
“Hm”, Vulpes mulled the situation over in his head. “If I help you in getting the chip from Benny, will you allow me to follow you into the 38? I need to know what Mr. House plans to do with the chip”   
“Uh, yeah. But why?” Aurelia’s eyes narrowed as she seemed to search is face.   
“It’s my duty, my love. Towards you and towards Caesar, you know this”, Vulpes chuckled and let a small smile play over his face. It seemed to reassure her.   
“Yes, of course”   
“Of course…Hm?” Vulpes looked at her intently, she at least needed to learn how to address him properly, since it was obvious that had completely vanished from her mind, considering her tone to him during their row. She looked at him with a confused expression, wondering what he was getting at. “Husband”, Vulpes said. “That is how you will address me while we’re on our own from now on. Do you understand?”   
“Uh, yeah…Husband”, Six frowned.   
Vulpes cupped her chin in his hand and smiled towards her, “My dear, you speak our language without flaw, but you seem to have completely forgotten about our culture, _decorum_. The profligate way is very unflattering for a beautiful woman of your status”   
“My status? What do you mean?”   
“You’re the wife of the first of the Frumentarii my dear”, Vulpes smiled and stroked her chin.   
“The Frumentarii, you’re the praefectus of the Frumentarii?”   
“So I am, you’re an officer’s wife now, Aurelia”   
“That is, well, forgive me for asking, husband, but I’ve been able to deduce that I’m 20 years old after studying the brand I have on my back – somehow, you’re so exceptionally young. Are we the same age?”   
“No, we’re not”, Vulpes gave her an honest smile at that, it was such a very innocent question. She really had no idea. “I’m eleven years your senior”   
“You’re 31?” she smiled, her eyes beamed slightly, “My, you have good genes”   
“I do, and so do you. Atticus is a lucky boy”, Vulpes could almost feel his heart warming a little at the thought of his son. As soon as there was time, he and Aurelia needed to go visit him in Flagstaff.   
“I wish to meet him, our boy”, Aurelia said, looking at Vulpes.   
“We’ll arrange that as soon as we can. He’s in Flagstaff, safe, with the priestesses”   
“Good”, she nodded. “Can I ask you something else?”   
“Sure, ask me whatever you’d like”, Vulpes leaned back into the couch and pulled an arm around Aurelia.   
“How long have we been married?”   
“Six years”   
“Six years? I was…14 when we married?”   
“Yes”   
“And how old is Atticus?”   
“He is four, you had him the spring before you turned 16”   
“And we don’t have any other children?”   
“None that have survived, no. You’ve birthed one stillborn daughter, the year after Atticus and before him you had two miscarriages”  
“Oh”   
“It’s nothing to worry about, my love. It’s normal, unfortunately. It’s the radiation, amongst other things”   
“The stillborn girl, did she have a name? Did we have a funeral?”   
“We burned a pyre, yes. You gave her the name Aella”  
“Whirlwind, in ancient Greek”   
“You remember that? Of all things?” Vulpes couldn’t help himself from smiling at that. He had raided a tribe hauled up in a library just after Atticus was born and there Vulpes had found an old archive of ancient research and he brought some of the books back with him, one of them a dictionary of ancient Greek. Aurelia had more or less read it like it was fiction.   
She smiled, looking back at him and it filled him with a warmth he seldom felt. There was something about her that had always made him feel just content, she filled that right spot within him that without her was like an empty hole, an open wound. It didn’t matter how she looked, she had always been beautiful to him – in a way any other woman never could have been, no matter their immaculate beauty. No one had that electricity about her, which Aurelia had. As she sat there, beside him in the couch, in her midnight blue dress that just made her eyes that much more intensely blue – _he loved her_. Loved her more than he had ever loved her before. And with that, he could be honest to himself, he could honestly say that he would do anything for the woman sitting beside him. But he would never let her go again, he could not allow it.

***


	6. Cupid’s Victim

“So, Alerio and Cato is going to follow Benny out of New Vegas as he escapes, and apprehend him in the desert and bring him before Caesar?” Six looked at her husband as he was getting dressed. Her blue dress was hanging over a chair and Vulpes had even put her heels tidily beneath the chair.   
“Yes”, Vulpes nods as he buttoned up a fresh shirt.   
“How do you know he’ll try to run?”   
“He’s a coward”   
Six raised a brow and looked at Vulpes with questioning eyes.   
“He needed four Khans to put you in the grave, didn’t he? Of course he’ll try to run. And if he doesn’t, I’ll kill him in the casino”   
“But then you wont get the pleasure of torturing him”   
“Oh, my love, I’ll get the pleasure no matter were he dies, believe you me. He’ll only suffer for a more…extended amount of time if he’s brought before Caesar”   
Six nodded slowly to herself, considering the plan Vulpes had laid out for her last night.   
“I’ll have to see about getting you some real lingerie before this evening”, Vulpes said and nodded towards her naked chest.   
“Huh?”   
“Underwear, dear. You can’t wear that roman bust wrap under a profligate dress, it just doesn’t look right”   
“If you say so…” Six shrugged, “Husband”, she smiled. Almost forgot about the decorum.   
“Come here, I’ll help you with the wrap. You probably need to head back to the 38, but I want you to return here later this afternoon”  
“Should I bring a new dress with me?”   
“No, I’ll make sure to get you the proper attire. That blue dress, gorgeous as you are in it, isn’t your proper size. You’re skinnier than I’d like you to be, but that can easily be rectified”, he smirked and Six looked up at him with a pout. “Don’t worry Aurelia, you’re beautiful. I’ve just always enjoyed you being a bit more…Soft”   
“I’m soft”, Six protested looking down at her slightly pouting stomach. She had a natural hourglass figure that she thought was rather satisfactory.   
“Not as soft as you used to be, your hips and bust used to be fuller. You are eating, I hope?”   
“Of course I’m eating. Guess I’ve been walking the desert more than I used to”   
“Yes. Stop walking the desert”, she could hear the smile on his voice. Though she could also make out a seriousness behind the smile. She wasn’t supposed to walk around the desert, fighting her way through raiders and predators. She was supposed to be stationed in their home in Flagstaff, or whatever was their home at the Fort. 

Six wanted to see her son. The conflict within her had to give way for the love she felt towards her baby, even though she couldn’t remember him – her whole being had reacted with force when Vulpes had mentioned their son – Atticus, and she knew with full certainty that he was real. She felt it with her entire body that she was a mother, a fierce mother at that and she needed to at least see her son. The son she had abandoned. What had she been thinking? Surely nothing could be so bad that you abandon your own flesh and blood?   
She felt an immense guilt and regret over the fact that she had been away from Atticus for two long years. For a child, two years was a lifetime, and he was only four years old. She could understand that with her gone, Vulpes had to send him to Flagstaff. Vulpes was a legionary, a soldier and an officer at that – he couldn’t take care of a small child, not even with the help of slaves. As Six understood it, the Fort was a military encampment – it wasn’t really a place for a child. They had lived there when Atticus was born, Vulpes told her, but they had planned to send him to the temple in Flagstaff when he was six years old no matter where they were stationed. As his wife, it was Six’s – or well, Aurelia’s – duty to be at her husband’s side, wherever he was. As an officer he spent so much time out on the field, they wouldn’t be able to create any children if she spent her time in Flagstaff – and it was a virtue for a husband and a wife to have as many children as possible. That is why Caesar allowed females to marry so young, to allow them to birth as many children as possible. 

She had spent the night with Vulpes and they had made love, several times. Each time, he had been both demanding but at the same time so gentle. He had read her body completely, better than she possibly could read herself or him. She had only known herself for little over a month, whilst Vulpes had known her for years, lived with her and shared everything with her. He had been with her when she gave birth to Atticus and later Aella – he had described their births for her while they lay curled up together in the bed, reveling in their afterglow. 

After Vulpes had helped her get dressed, they left the Ultra-Luxe together and Vulpes kissed her goodbye with a passion she never thought he would show in public, softly grabbing her neck and almost devouring her lips. The kiss made her knees weak and she couldn’t help the smile that crept up on her. There was such an odd familiarity to being close to him, that felt right and just as it should be. She wanted to drown in his smell, the warm tones of leather mixed with soap and herbs.   
“I’ll see you in a few hours, Lupa”, he whispered in her ear before he turned and walked away, disappearing into the crowd of gamblers, tourists and NCR soldiers.   
Six reminded herself that she needed to switch over to the common tongue when she got back to the 38. She hadn’t spoken in only Latin for such an extended amount of time before – at least not that she could remember, and it would only make Boone suspicious if she came back, having spent the night elsewhere and spoke in the Legion’s tongue.

“There you are! We were worried sick when you didn’t come back last night – thought something might have happened to you”, Veronica rushed towards her as she stepped out of the elevator and entered the presidential at the 38.   
“There’s no need for you to worry about me, Ronnie. I survived being shot in the head, remember?” Six smiled slyly and winked towards Veronica. “Where’s Boone?”   
“He left early, said he was taking a walk outside the walls, needed some air or something like it. I don’t know, he mumbles a lot”   
“Yeah, I know”, Six snorted and went over to the fridge, grabbing a Sarsaparilla. “Do you want anything?”   
“No, I’m good”, Veronica answered from the couch. “So, where were you last night? What happened? Did you meet Benny?”   
“Nah, meeting him tonight”   
“So…What did you do last night?”   
Six screwed the cap off the bottle and sat down across Veronica in the couch, frowning. “Aren’t you the curious one?”   
Veronica’s eyes narrowed as a smile grew on her lips, “You met someone, didn’t you?”   
“I don’t kiss and tell”, Six chuckled as she took a swig from the Sarsaparilla.   
“Oh come on, that’s unfair!” Veronica sighed and rolled her eyes. “Gimme something, I’m dying over here. Where, who, how?”   
“Ronnie!” Six nudged her leg with one foot and smirked. “All right, he’s an old lover of sorts. I recognized him”   
“No? Seriously? That’s amazing, Six! He knew you from before?” Veronica gasped and smiled widely.   
“Yeah, something like that, I suppose”, Six smiled and nodded carefully as she fingered her sarsaparilla bottle.   
“So? Where? How?” Veronica leaned in closer to her, “And, does he know your real name? Tell me he does! He must, mustn’t he, since he knew you before, right?”   
“Uh, well – it’s kind of complicated, you know”, Six tried to imply that they hadn’t exactly been on a name-basis, which seemed to work as Veronica had to stifle a loud ‘Oh’ and then sniggered. “But, I decided to take a walk along the Strip, check out the different casinos and such, since I’ve only ever seen it from the ground during the day – and I ended up at the Ultra-Luxe. Turns out he’s staying there for a while and so…Well”   
“The Ultra-Luxe, gosh, Six – that place is supposed to be real expensive. He’s rich?”   
“I don’t know, really”, Six shrugged with a smile. “Never asked”   
“My god, he’s a gangster or something, isn’t he?” Veronica covered her mouth like she’d just said something very dirty or inappropriate. “Or a politician, it’s not president Kimball, is it?”   
“Who?”   
“The president of the NCR, of course. How can you still not know these things? Seriously!”  
Six shrugged again and pointed to her head, “Guess I’m a bit brain damaged”   
“You’re not, just…Weird. Oh well, I hope you had a grand time, while I was stuck here with Boone, worrying about your sorry ass”   
“Stuck? It’s not like the two of you are on house arrest of anything”, Six rolled her eyes at Veronica.   
“I know, I know. So, you gonna take care of Benny tonight then?”   
“Yeah”  
“Still don’t need any help?”   
“Nope, my rich gangster politician is helping”   
“You know, I might just start believing he actually is a rich gangster politician”, Veronica frowned.   
“Don’t worry Ronnie”

***

Six returned to Vulpes’ suite at the Ultra-Luxe during the afternoon, as he had asked her. Marjorie was at the reception just as yesterday evening, but this time around, she greeted Six with a smile and a “Good day Mrs. Fox, your husband has yet to return, but go on ahead and I’m certain he’ll be here shortly” and Six smiled and nodded in return. For some unknown reason, Six did not like Marjorie – there was something about her that just rubbed Six the wrong way.  
Vulpes had given her a key to the suite and she entered it, closing the door behind her and took her first real look around the rooms. It was hard paying attention to the things around you while Vulpes was present, it was as if he sucked in all the light in the room and concentrated it on himself. Once you had laid eyes on him, it was difficult to look away, or perhaps she was just falling in love with the man she was married to. She had to be careful, since she had known from the very first time she saw him in Nipton, that he was disturbed. When he showed up in her bedroom, she realized how dangerous he was and how manipulative – but she couldn’t help herself. Were those the reason she had decided to leave him, those two years ago? She still couldn’t get her mind around her leaving. They had a son together, what kind of mother abandons her own child and leaves it in the hands of a manipulative psychopath?  
Had she planned to come back for Atticus? Then why hadn’t she? From her current viewpoint, it didn’t make any sense. Could Atticus be dead? Had Vulpes lied about their son being alive? He told her about Aella, that she was dead. Was Vulpes a man who would lie about a dead child, because that there was or had been an Atticus, of that Six was sure – absolutely certain, but something inside her told her it didn’t make sense. It was as if her mind struggled to admit to the very fact that she herself could have been the one who was a bad parent. Was that so impossible? She wasn’t the same person now as she had been two years ago. She wouldn’t have been, even though she hadn’t survived her own death. The whole thing just got so much more complicated by the fact that she couldn’t remember, by the fact that she didn’t actually know and she couldn’t trust Vulpes to tell her the truth.  
Was it worth it, devoting herself completely to her husband and his cause, for a child that might, or might not exist?  
Six wanted to slap herself, how could she even consider abandoning her child, again? This, if anything, proved she was a lousy mother, a bad parent. She needed to find out for sure, if Atticus lived. If it turned out Vulpes had lied to her, about her child, about their child – she would kill him with her bare hands.

***

Vulpes entered his suite with a package, it contained a grey pre-war full-skirt dress in with large black embroided flowers on the skirt, short sleeves and a modest décolletage – but slightly more fancy than the sheath dress Aurelia had worn the day before. He had also been able to get a hold of proper lingerie for her, a long line bra, a waspie, a girdle and real stockings. Within the Legion, neither men nor women wore underwear like they did in pre-war times, it just wasn’t necessary nor very practical, since everyone wore either a tunic or a toga. Women wrapped their bosoms if they needed, but bras and other kinds of undergarments were contraband. To blend in with all kinds of groups, the Frumentarii had access to many different pre-war and profligate clothes, both male and female. The dress he had found for Aurelia, one of two dresses that would fit her perfectly without having to sew the dress on her, had been this grey one. Vulpes hoped that his guesses were right about the underwear as well, but he happened to have a good eye when it came to female forms.

Aurelia had been chocked when she saw the vast amount of clothing she was supposed to wear, but patiently let Vulpes dress her properly, snagging her inside the bra, strapping on the waspie and then pulling up the girdle. Fastening the stockings to the girdle’s garter straps was unbelievably erotic to Vulpes. Of course, he’d slept with many women who used girdles, even some that could afford stockings – but to see Aurelia in such forbidden clothes, was something new entirely. He hadn’t gotten her any panties, since it would make it easier for her to use the toilet without wearing a pair – and it would certainly give him easier access for when he was going to fuck her. 

Aurelia was just about to fetch the grey dress that she eyed eagerly with fascination, when Vulpes stopped her.   
“Lupa”, Vulpes smirked looking at the young woman all wrapped up in pre-war silk.   
“Yes, husband?” Aurelia answered, turning to look at him.  
“On your knees”, he told her in a soft voice and she obeyed, looking up at him with her large blue eyes, just slightly hidden behind her long dark lashes. Had she always been this beautiful? Of course she had. How a man like Aurelius of Phoenix could father such a wonder, was beyond Vulpes, but she was extraordinarily beautiful just as she was. Right where she was, on her knees in front of him. He stroked her cheek and let a strand of her thick dark hair roll between his fingers. “Do you know what to do?”   
Aurelia looked at the straining bulge in his pants and then looked up at him again, smiling with a stoked look in her eyes. He nodded and she started to unbuckle his belt, it didn’t take her many seconds before her full lips where wrapped around him, her head bobbing back and forth while one of her hands caressed his balls and the other hand pulling his foreskin back along with the rhythm of her lip’s movement. Some things women just couldn’t forget, it seemed, or she was just a natural when it came to cock-sucking, this wife of his. In his current state he couldn’t really remember if she always had been this good, but he could never say he’d been disappointed by her sexual attentions.  
Vulpes grabbed a full fist of her full hair and when he felt he was getting closer, he pumped himself in her mouth, almost choking her and making her gag, but he didn’t care. He needed that release, he needed her to fucking take him and when he ejaculated between those pretty lips of hers, he let out a strained moan and a small chuckle. Aurelia licked her lips and then dried them off with her hand, looking quite smug down there, on her knees.

***

The plan for going to the Tops, was mainly just to get Benny fleeing, it would be much easier and a lot less complicated if Alerio and Cato apprehended him in the desert. If Six was to be completely honest, what Benny had done to her, he didn’t deserve anything less than crucifixion and the wrath of her vengeful husband. Vulpes might have done worse things in his life, or well, he definitely had, but who hadn’t done horrible things in this truly mad world?  
Vulpes had gotten her a small .22 caliber that she had strapped to her thigh, just in case things would end up violently. And so Six entered the casino like the returning ghost of a nightmare, with her husband just a few steps behind her.

The doorman at the Tops recognized both Six and Vulpes immediately, which unnerved her. Vulpes however, wasn’t recognized as a legionary, but as the notorious Mr. Fox. Was there anywhere around the Strip where he hadn’t turned himself into a high roller? The fact that Six was recognized, as a Mrs. Ivy Zeigel, no less, helped her get past the usual pat-downs for weapons and soon she found herself on the ground floor of the casino.   
The doorman had looked very surprised to see her, but hadn’t commented on it any further, instead he had wished her a pleasant evening and told her it was lovely seeing her again. Vulpes had raised a questioning eyebrow, but didn’t say anything about it and as soon as they were inside, he did as he had done a few times by now – disappeared completely into the crowd. 

Six walked over to the bar and leaned into the counter and immediately caught the barman’s attention.  
“Oh, Mrs. Zeigel, what a pleasant surprise”, the bartender eyed her with the same surprise as the doorman had and it was starting to make Six twitchy, not knowing what the hell was going on. Who had she been before? Why did they call her Mrs. Zeigel? Who was this woman? Perhaps Six just looked very much like her? “What can I get you?” the bartender asked her.  
“Rum & Nuka, if you don’t mind”, Six answered, battering her painted black lashes towards the slightly older man behind the bar.   
“Right away”

Six turned her back to the bar and leaned back, scanning the floor and curled her lips up in a relaxed way, trying to talk as much as possible with her facial features and at the same time ignoring the voice screaming inside her head that something was very, very wrong. She knew she could be good at this, the smooth games of gamblers and whores, everyone just trying their best to get by. The casino felt filthy and she could sense it penetrating her pours, she would need to have a long rinse once she was out of here.   
“One Rum & Nuka, Mrs. Zeigel”  
“Thank you kindly”, Six looked back over her shoulder and nodded to the bartender. Vulpes had to take care of the payment later and since the bartender made no move whatsoever to ask for caps, Six pretended not to care.   
She saw her husband speak to a blonde woman in the far west corner of the ground floor, she was giggling, covering her mouth and her cheeks where blushing. The sight almost stirred something within Six, jealousy? Was that a feeling she had ever experienced before? Perhaps, perhaps not. She couldn’t tell. However, what she could tell was that she needed to keep her cool, it wouldn’t do to march over to _Mr. Fox_ and that hussy, trying to claw the eyes out of the clingy woman. It could be something work-related for Vulpes. Right now, it wasn’t Six’s place to criticize him. 

She took her drink and sipped it carefully. Once she had realized where she came from, it had become so much clearer to her why she was useless in holding down her liquor – alcohol was prohibited within the Legion. Vulpes, however, drank alcohol on a regular basis due to his work. As a spy, secret military police or whatever you wished to call it, he needed to blend in and tonight, she needed to blend in as well.   
The Nuka Cola was completely destroyed by the rum, it tasted like someone had tried to mix in gasoline with the Cola and Six had to do her best not to grimace in response to the taste. 

“What in the goddamn…?” a voice sounded to her left and soon enough a hand tightly clutched her upper arm, “Let’s keep this in the groove, yeah? Smooth moves, pussycat, smooth like little babies…”

***


	7. The Biggest Little City in the World

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I recommend listening to **Nelson Riddle - Playboy's Theme** while reading this chapter, as it is all about Benny.   
>  Borrowed the idea from the lovely fic "The Playboy" (http://archiveofourown.org/works/6977164/chapters/15901324) and it really helped me write Benny, which I've found hard before.

_6 months earlier, New Reno_

She had been gone for over a year, perhaps longer – she was starting to lose count, the months had started to flash by without her noticing. She had travelled around, taking the odd job here and there, supporting herself the best way she could. She no longer could remember how many times she had considered prostitution as a means to have a constant flow of caps, but something about selling yourself for caps just didn’t sit right with her. If she sold herself, then she’d be no better than her father or her husband, for that matter. Sometimes she considered doing it just out of spite, but she no longer held any loyalty towards her husband, so why should she? She had broken free and it had cost her. It had cost her more than she could have ever imagined. She was sure that he was after her, in some way or another and she didn’t and hadn’t felt safe anywhere from the Frumentarius wrath. The only thing she had wanted was to feel free, free from the clutches of domestic life, free from the unwanted chains that were motherhood. She had been able to convince herself that Atticus would be better off without her, she just kept hurting him – unwillingly, of course, but still hurting him. His brain was probably completely scrambled by now from how many times she had dropped him and she was actually surprised that Vulpes hadn’t noticed. Maybe he just chose to ignore it, there really was no telling how her husband’s thoughts worked. 

_Vulpes_. The husband she had escaped, her slaver and her mortal god. Was it possible to hate someone so much that you loved them? Or perhaps love them so much that you eventually start to hate them?   
He was a bastard, but a gentle bastard, deeply disturbed and all around completely fucked up. A day couldn’t pass her by, without her thinking about Vulpes, he was everything she could have ever asked for, or at least in a man of the Legion. But she had realized that too late. She had grown so tired of being pushed around, forcefully handled and having everything decided for her. It was too late to crawl back with her tail between her legs now, she needed to forget the oh so well forged man with his prominent cheekbones, piercing light eyes and so perfectly demanding but yet gentle touch. He had probably forgotten his desires for her by now, or at least he would have no use for her anymore – besides torturing and killing her as a punishment for bolting. He would most likely have taken a new wife, had more children and continued on with his life. 

Does that sound like the possessive fucker that she was sold off to? Of course he’d carry a grudge, but there was no way in Hades that he’d ever take her back and treat her as well as he had before.   
She had been an impulsive idiot, believing the profligate men were better than their Legion counterparts. But they weren’t, were they? They hid behind nice words and polite manners, but they were in every way the same kind of rapists, wife beaters and tyrants as the legionaries. At least within the Legion, you sort of knew what to expect – it didn’t come as a bitter surprise a few months after you’ve sealed the deal. As soon as you found yourself knocked up, it seemed as if the beatings started.   
That was Ivy’s experience in the matter in any case, experience she’d gained by living in several different tribes all over the southwest whilst travelling. 

Eventually she had found herself up in northern NCR-territory, in the NCR’s Mecca of Sin – New Reno, and if you’d think that abandoning her family and running away should have been counted as the biggest mistake of her life, well, it wasn’t. Because it was here, in New Reno that she met the biggest mistake of her life, _Benny_.

***

Ivy had more or less stumbled into New Reno, passing the large, and quite fairly, stupid, sign about being the biggest little town in the world. _Who came up with that, anyway_? She had headed up north from Sac-Town with the Happy Trails Caravan Company to New Reno, thankful for the company after almost getting herself killed by the pure anarchy in the city that was the NCR’s former capital.  
It didn’t take her long to find work in New Reno, she stumbled in under the idiotic sign and found herself in front of the first establishment on the street, the Cat’s Paw. Turned out to be a brothel always in need of pretty girls willing to do a lot of hard work. Fortunately, Ivy wasn’t the kind of girl that was inclined to prostitution. A normally constituted man couldn’t possibly handle her audacious and know it all-attitude, but in a town like Reno, her attitude was perfect for reception-work, so that’s where Ivy ended up. She was the receptionist, helping out Miss Kitty and the working girls with anything they needed.

On one of those regular weekend nights when Ivy minded the reception, sitting nonchalantly in her chair behind the counter, having her nails done – a tall man walked in through the door. His bronze skin was perfectly sun-kissed and his dark, slightly grey speckled hair was meticulously drawn back into a pompadour with a duck’s tail in the back. His deep brown eyes wandered around the brothel’s reception area while he reached down into his pocket for a golden flip-lighter and removed a cigarette from behind his ear and placed it between his lips. He had two thugs with him that stood just a few steps back, with their hands in their pockets, casually showing off their holstered weapons from inside their opened suit-jackets. The one standing in front of the two thugs, obviously the leader, wore a chequered jacket, but it’s top button was closed and as his eyes met Ivy’s, something within her fluttered. His nose was chiseled to perfection and his lips were pouty and full, not unlike her own. She hardly even noticed how she bit down on one side of her bottom lip and how her eyes narrowed seductively as she watched the man draw closer to her counter. 

“So, this fine establishment’s the Cat’s Paw, is it?” the man drew his lips out in a confident smile.   
“Indeed it is, sir”, Ivy smiled, batting her painted eyelashes and rose up from her chair onto her heeled feet, teasingly correcting her slinky skirt that clasped her hips in a most delicate way but still modest enough, reaching down below her knees. Miss Kitty wanted her to look sexy in a pre-war way, enticing the john’s in the best way possible, while still retaining a certain class. “How may we serve you fine gentlemen this evening?”   
“Please baby doll, a man could spend the entire evening just looking at you. You’re not one of the girls, are ya?” the handsome man gave her a mischievously playful smile.   
“I’m afraid I’m only the receptionist, Mr.?”   
“Benny Zeigel”, the man winked and presented Ivy with his hand.   
“Ivy”, she took his hand and squeezed it lightly.   
Benny chuckled softly, still smiling widely, looking at her and their eyes seemed to lock together for a moment, before Ivy realized that her behavior perhaps was a bit too accommodating. She let go of his hand and pointed her hand towards the bar, “To your left you’ll find our bar and restaurant. There’s always some kind of entertainment there, along with a blackjack table and some games of poker. To your right is where you’ll find our different specialties, depending on what you fancy for the evening. If you’re looking for something in particular, might I suggest you talk with our manager, Miss Kitty, you can find her in there with our _assortments_ ”   
“So, this Miss Kitty, is she the one I should be talking to if I want to take you out for a drink?” the man winked.   
Ivy had to push back a snort, this man was certainly persistent, but Ivy leaned in closer to the fancy man with the dark hair combed with pomade, who leaned in closer to her at the same time. “I’m not allowed to fraternize with the patrons”, Ivy whispered and the man smiled again.   
“So, the madam’s your mother, is she?”   
Ivy laughed quietly, “You’re not from around here, are you?”   
“Nah, honey baby, I ain’t-”  
“Ivy! Are these gentlemen getting the service they’re expecting?” Miss Kitty came walking out of the working girls area.   
“We are, mam”, Benny straightened up and gave Miss Kitty the same charming smile. “We’ll settle for the bar, at the moment”, he said and then winked towards Ivy, who had moved closer to Miss Kitty, backing away from this Benny guy. 

“Did you find out who they are?” Kitty whispered to Ivy when the three men left the reception and walked towards the bar.   
“The one in the chequered jacket’s name is Benny Zeigel, the other two I don’t know. They sound like they’re from farther down south”, Ivy spoke quietly.   
“If that’s Benny Zeigel, then they are”, Kitty mused with a strange expression on her face.   
“What? Who’s he?” Ivy asked.   
“A very powerful gangster. If that man really is Benny Zeigel, he is the boss of the Chairmen-family in New Vegas”

***

The hours of the evening ticked by as they always did, for being a Saturday, the Cat’s Paw was calm but the business was good as usual. The Reno families were in the middle of a peace and so the hit-frequency had dropped down remarkably and most everyone seemed to lay low for the time being, minding their own business. The john’s that entered this evening were mostly gamblers and tourists visiting Reno for their own different reasons.

Ivy had kept an eye on the fancy looking New Vegas-gangster in the chequered jacket, his two thugs had left for the working girls area, but this Benny-fella remained in the bar – casting glances her way, sipping on bourbon and smoking cigarette after cigarette. When his two thugs left the room on the right and entered the bar, it was clear that they were leaving. Benny came walking towards her again, obviously a bit more cautious about the madam, making sure she wasn’t lurking somewhere in the shadows.   
“So, Ivy, when do you clock out?” he asked leaning in to her again.   
“Clock out? I don’t, really. Why?” she arched a brow, looking up at the tall man.   
“What, you don’t get any breaks or anythin’? I wanna take you out for a drink, baby doll”   
“My shift ends at 3 a.m. if that’s what you mean?”   
“Sure, yeah. Would ya meet me outside then?”  
Ivy pondered it in her mind, she was getting bored of spending her days and evenings in a reception – a reception in a brothel. Even though Miss Kitty had been good to her, giving her a solid pay and a roof over her head, this wasn’t a place she wanted to stay in forever. Just because she went with this Benny-guy once, didn’t mean she’d have to up and leave or anything. It wasn’t against the rules for her to go home with men after hours, Kitty just didn’t like it.   
“I’ll think about it, all right?” Ivy answered, giving Benny a coy smile, but considering his reaction to that, her eyes were telling another story.   
“I’ll be waiting”, he said and then he turned to leave. Before he walked out of the door, he looked over his shoulder and winked. 

When the clock turned 3 a.m. and the Paw’s other receptionist came to start her shift, Ivy was able to sneak out and she didn’t know why, but she was a bit surprised to see Benny standing by himself, arrogantly leaned against the brick wall, smoking a cigarette and waiting for her.   
A smiled played over his lips when he caught sight of her and he pushed himself off of the wall and closed the distance between them.   
“Sneakin’ out like a school girl, are ya?” he sniggered and kissed her cheek.   
“Something like that, yeah”, Ivy gave him a small smile. “So, what do you have in mind? The sun will start to come up soon”   
“What? The bars and casinos in this town close at some point?”   
“They don’t where you’re from?”   
“Nah, they’re open round the clock. If you don’t set foot outside, it’s easy to lose track of what time it is all together”   
“So, where exactly is it that you’re from?” Ivy already knew, but it didn’t hurt to ask before she accidentally blurted something out.   
“Vegas”, Benny smiled and they started walking. He offered her a smoke, which she declined. She seldom drank and she didn’t even touch cigarettes or chems. She might have chosen to become a profligate by leaving the Legion, but some principals were ground so deeply within her, it just felt wrong to defy them. “The hotel I’m staying in has a bar I think still should be open”, he said.   
“The hotel bars usually are, I guess”, Ivy couldn’t help blushing slightly.

Benny’s charm really got to her. He was talkative and nice and he moved with a smooth grace she’d seldom seen in a man. It was quite obvious he was a ladies man who usually got exactly what he wanted. Ivy was married to such a man and she recognized it immediately. Being a ladies man was Vulpes' job, as a Frumentarius he seduced women for information, played them until they handed him what he wanted on a silver platter. As a person, his womanizing was slightly different. In the Legion, there was no such thing as infidelity – it just didn’t exist, since a man simply couldn’t be unfaithful. And a woman didn’t have a choice. It was a rather easy thing to sort out, really – much easier than it was with the profligates, as Ivy was forced to learn. In the Legion, a man could fuck any slave he wanted, man or woman – as long as the legionary was the one doing the _fucking_ and not getting fucked. If a legionary of lower rank took the woman or slave of a higher ranked legionary without clearing this beforehand with the owner, the lower ranked legionary was punished – depending on the severity of his crime. As a woman in the Legion, you were always owned by someone – if it wasn’t a master who had bought you for whatever reason, it was your husband or your father or another close relative, a brother or cousin depending on your circumstances and the one who owned you decided who you were allowed to sleep with. If you slept with someone without your owner allowing it, as a woman you would most likely be killed. It was as easy as that. If you were raped and already belonged to someone, the rapist was punished, you had already been punished through the rape – but if you became pregnant from the rape and you were married, your husband could set you aside, or kill you. When she first heard the word ‘unfaithful’ in the context of two people who were together, she actually didn’t know what it meant. She had no idea. When a kind soul decided to try and explain it to her, she was just as dumb puzzled as she had been before, it just didn’t come together in her mind, until later on. But that didn’t matter, nothing really mattered anymore. The only thing she could even try to care about was the present and the present right then and there, was a gangster from New Vegas who seemed to be completely flabbergasted by her. 

They had a few drinks in the hotel bar and Ivy did her best to drink carefully, since she knew that her body wasn’t used to the effects of alcohol. Benny however, seemed to be more than home with heavy drinking and he swigged down more than a few shots of bourbon while they sat at the bar and talked silently to each other. He was smooth and she could understand that the women stood on cue to get their hands on him. What fascinated her was his keen interest in her, she knew she was pretty with her long dark brown hair and large blue eyes, but she was nothing special – especially not compared to the many utterly gorgeous women that moved around Reno at all hours. But somehow, Benny had decided he was going to have her. And what did she have to lose? Absolutely nothing. She probably had quite a hefty bounty on her head and as soon as she would even come a tiny bit too close to Legion lands, Vulpes would find her. She had heard rumors that he no longer was a simple Frumentarius, instead he had climbed the ladder even higher and become _the_ Frumentarius – Caesar’s first within the Frumentarii - a praefectus. She’d expected nothing less from her husband. He had advanced from decanus just a few years earlier through being whipped almost to death – and he wore the scars from his severe punishment with pride. 

One second, Ivy was in the bar and in what felt like a heartbeat, Ivy found herself in the elevator going up to Benny’s suite, with his hands snaked around her waist and his lips nuzzling her neck feverishly. As he pressed her close to him, she could feel his arousal against her abdomen and she decided just to lean into it, let go and just flow with it all. _Fuck it, fuck it all_.   
They stumbled into his suite and Ivy’s hands were already under his shirt, touching his scarred but velvety and warm skin. A former tribal warrior, hm? Ivy leaned into his deep kisses and drank in the taste from his bourbon and cigarettes, combined with the smell of pomade and pre-war aftershave. His lips were soft and excitingly fleshy as she nibbled them while his hands had started to undress her and pull of her slinky skirt and blouse. 

When a breast wrap instead of a pre-war bra greeted him, he raised his eyebrows in slight surprise. “You’re a tribal?”   
“No, but you are. I can tell”, Ivy cooed as she buttoned up his shirt and tied up his tie.   
“It’s been a long time since I saw a woman use a wrapping, ‘s all”, he said in a hoarse voice and traced her neck with his lips.   
“Mm, I bet you’ve only had fancy ladies for a long, long time”, Ivy purred teasingly.   
“Dull, fancy ladies”, Benny groaned as she grinded her hips into him, stroking his erection with her hand. “Baby, you’re driving me crazy”, he breathed before lifting her up from under her bottom and carrying her over to the bed, kissing her all along the way. They fell into the bed completely without grace, too caught up in desire, sweat and moaning.   
Benny was the first man she had allowed to enter her since she ran from her former life, the first man to take her willingly since she became Ivy and left Aurelia behind. And boy, did he ever take her. He was just as smooth between the sheets as he was a smooth talker and Ivy enjoyed every minute of it. By the time he entered her, she felt like she was dripping and he took such good care of her, making her come repeatedly before he even gave in to his own pleasure. 

By the time they were finished, Ivy was so spent she could hardly move. Benny lay beside her, smoking and trailing her body with his fingers, making sure he got to know every part of her.   
“You’re a mother?” he suddenly asked, having just stroked his gentle fingertips over her abdomen.   
“In another life”, Ivy answered lazily. Benny nodded carefully, as if he didn’t want to step on any tender toes. It was a kindness she gladly took.   
“I ain’t gonna force you to talk about it. Everyone’s got his or her fair share of secrets”, he said.   
“Yeah”, Ivy took a deep breath, “That’s the fucking truth, isn’t it?”   
“But you’re not from the NCR, are ya?”  
“No, I’m not”, Ivy’s lips twitched slightly. Perhaps he had been too caught up in their lovemaking to notice the brand that was burned in on her back. The brand with the bull and the roman numbers and letters. If he’d seen it, he wouldn’t have asked. Ivy turned around to lie on her stomach and removed the hair from the back of her neck, letting him see the brand. It didn’t matter anyhow.   
Benny’s eyes widened and he took in a sharp breath, “That’s a Legion brand”, he said in a hushed voice, “…For slaves”   
“Mm”, Ivy hummed. “I was born in Arizona”   
“Fancied I recognized your accent”, he mumbled, tracing her brand with his fingers. “It looks old”  
“It is”  
“How old were you? When you got it, I mean”   
“The bull and the numbers, detailing my birth year and the month written besides it, I got when I was five or six years old”   
“But there’s a V.I just underneath it”   
“Yeah, it’s from when I got married”   
“You’re married? Oh, yeah, the marks on your stomach”   
“Uh huh, well, I don’t really view myself as married anymore. There’s no point”, Ivy sighed and leaned her head to the side against the pillow under her. 

Benny smiled softly towards her and pulled a strand of hair back from her face.   
“It’s a fucked up world out there, pussycat. But you’ve survived and every scar that it has given you, has only made you stronger”   
“I suppose someone like you would say that”, Ivy smirked.   
“Someone like me?” Benny raised an eyebrow in question.   
“A big, fancy New Vegas gangster, filled with scars like a tribal warrior”   
“Well, I suppose you’re right on both accounts, baby”, Benny chuckled and leaned down and kissed her. “Come with me to Vegas, Ivy”   
“I…I don’t know”  
“There ain’t nothin’ keeping you here, is there?” Benny lay down on his side beside her, cupping her cheek in his hand.   
“Not really, no”, Ivy sighed, “But Vegas is too close to Legion lands”   
“The Strip’s protected. I bet you there are more legionaries in Reno than in Vegas, they haven’t got half the security we have. I’ll take care of you baby doll, give you everything you could wish for”   
“It’s not a matter of stuff, Benny”, Ivy frowned, “The man I was married to, or, still am, he’s not just any legionary, he’s dangerous”   
“So am I, if you’re with me, he can’t hurt you. Just, think about it, yeah? I’ll be leaving in two days”  
“I’ll think about it”, Ivy nodded and yawned quietly.

***


	8. Ring-A-Ding-Ding

_3 months earlier, New Vegas_

“Come on babe, you need to help me out here, it is the only way – that chip holds the power to the whole Strip. It’s unnatural for that half dead pre-war fink to be locked up in there, like he’s in his own personal mausoleum”, Benny paced back and forth in their suite on the 13th floor of the Tops Casino. His normally bronzed skin looked pale as he moved back and forth with a nervous annoyance that was beginning to drive Ivy mad. Benny became all too jittery when things didn’t go as he had planned.  
“Hey, I agree with you – it isn’t natural, but just because you want me to run around the desert, pretending to be a courier, doesn’t mean I’m gonna do it”, Ivy gesticulated with her arms, making small swirling movements suggesting a confused movement. “You said you would protect me from the Legion, sending me out in the fucking desert, ain’t my definition of protection”  
“Honey baby, you know I’d never let anything harm you”, Benny turned and looked at her, “I’ve given vows for god’s sake”  
“You know my first husband said pretty much the exact same thing, now I live with a price on my head!”, Ivy spat, turning her back to Benny as she sat in the barstool.  
“Don’t fucking compare me to that sick cunt!”  
“Oh, don’t act so high and mighty, you’re all the same, aren’t you? Is this when you’ll start beating me up? ‘Oh just put a ring on her finger and it’s all right to pound away!’” Ivy snarled, cursing herself for freely entering into another relationship with a power hungry man, believing he can use her as he sees fit.  
“I ain’t laid a hand on you, Ivy!” Benny shouted, “But I’m fucking desperate here doll, you gotta understand that. If the chairmen doesn’t take charge, someone else will and we’ll all end up six feet under out in the desert”, he said in a slightly calmer tone, grasping Ivy’s shoulders with his large warm hands. “C’mon babe, you understand, don’t ya?”  
“Why me? You’ve got a small army of thugs beneath you – use one of them!” Ivy spat and looked at Benny with defiance.  
“’Cause they’re known by others, they move around outside the Tops, you don’t. People only know I married, but almost nobody except the family knows to whom. Babe, who else am I supposed to trust with such a thing? Huh? Who else could I trust to bring the chip back to me?”  
“Uh, yourself, for starters?”  
“Oh c’mon, you can’t be fucking serious? Like I could walk outta here and pretend to all of a sudden be a courier. The fuck, Ivy? You think this is some kind of joke? Lemme tell ya, it ain’t. If we don’t do this, we’ll all die”  
Ivy let out an annoyed groan and rose from the barstool, looking up at Benny with narrowed, angry eyes, “I’ll fucking kill you if this goes sideways, I don’t care if you’re my husband, I’ll kill you”  
“It ain’t gonna go sideways pussycat, the Ben-man's got it all figured out, you’ll see. We’re gonna be royals babe, 18-karat diamond-royal”  
“Whatever Benny”, Ivy sighed as she walked out of the living room and into the bedroom, slamming the door behind her. _Fucking men_.

***

Ivy’s second wedding was a lavish affair, Benny hadn’t been kidding when he promised to give her anything she wished – not that she’d actually wished for much except security. In this marriage, she wasn’t walking around with a bomb collar around her neck, but she was pretty much confined to the Tops, mostly because she didn’t trust the securitrons guarding the Strip. That Mr. House-fella that Benny worked for was highly suspicious and Benny had started to talk about trying to do something about him. As if a sign from the gods, Benny was made aware of a Platinum Chip that would gain him control over Mr. Houses’ entire fleet of securitrons. Apparently, it had been missing since before the Great War, but Mr. House was now arranging for the chip to be transported back to him. Benny wanted the chip to be transported to himself instead and Benny and Ivy’s newly wed bliss had been abruptly ended by rows and arguing about that stupid chip. Benny was paranoid as ever, fully believing that the two other families was working on getting their hand on the chip as well and if they got it first, the entire Chairmen-family would end up deep in the dust. He wasn’t necessarily wrong, Ivy thought, however, she didn’t agree with the fact that he wanted to send her out in the desert, running after that stupid piece of metal.

Plan in itself was pretty simple, she would apply for work within the Mojave Express under another persona and then she would start doing run’s until it was time for the chip to be transported. Then Benny, as one of Mr. Houses most trusted 'employees' would suggest a certain courier to take the chip, making sure Mr. House gets it back. Mr. House wanted there to be five other Couriers, transporting useless chips, in case someone were going to try and steal the chip, as it held all that power. Ivy was supposed to be Courier Six and if everything worked out as it was supposed to, she would meet Benny in Goodsprings, delivering the chip to him and from there on out, he would take over the entire Strip and Mr. House’s fleet of securitrons stationed all over the Mojave.  
It didn’t matter, however, how simple a plan was – you could always count on something going wrong and Ivy just couldn’t afford to have something not go just as planned. She was living just on the edge of the lands held by the Legion and her husband could very well show up inside the very casino in which she lived. Inside the Tops and out on the Strip, she was protected – Benny had been right about that at least, he kept her protected – either by his men or Mr. House’s securitrons. But out in the desert, there she was on her own and she couldn’t very well travel with guards, no courier did. It would pin her out immediately as someone carrying something of value.  
Fucking Benny, should she just run away again? It had worked before and it could work again. 

No, she couldn’t keep running. What with both Vulpes and Benny after her, she wouldn’t be able to get very far, would she? Why did all the men she shacked up with have to be so dangerous? _Well_ , Ivy’s mind told her, _it’s simply because the world is dangerous and to survive, you become dangerous. None of your husbands would be alive if they weren’t dangerous. It really very simple, kill or be killed. It’s a cliché, yes – but that doesn’t make it less of a truth_.  
Shut up, brain. 

After moping around the Tops for a few days, trying to ignore her jittery husband, Ivy got dressed in a simple pair of fitted denim’s and a buttoned shirt, as well as a black Stetson. Benny had gotten her a pair of military boots as well as a caravan shotgun and a smaller sized combat knife she could strap to a holster around her thigh. Just before she turned around to make her way towards the Mojave Express’ HQ in Primm, Benny grabbed her and almost squeezed her to death, hugging her tightly with his surprisingly strong arms. Benny had been a tribal warrior once, but that was almost 20 years ago – nowadays, he spent his time drinking bourbon, smoking and counting caps – once in a while he used Maria, his gun, to blast someone’s face off or pistol whip some poor fuck to death – but that’s about the length to which his exercise reached. Physically, he was a far cry from the legionaries that Ivy had grown up amongst, but it didn’t matter to her. She loved Benny, _kind of_. He was kind and gentle, he pampered her and had as of yet not laid a hand on her, not even calling her a whore, even once. And for his age, he was very good looking. He had swept her off her feet in New Reno when she first saw him – and he had a timeless charm to him, despite his years, that very few men possessed.  
Ivy kissed Benny deeply and he answered with passion, lifting her off her feet and almost crushing her against him.  
“You’re platinum, pussycat” 

As soon as Ivy left the Strip, she pulled a scarf over her lower face, as to obscure her features further. Being outside like this, pricked her paranoia even further and it felt as she only made herself stand out even more from the crowd, the less conspicuous she tried to make herself. But then, she remembered Vulpes in his Vexillarius armor, nobody outside the Legion actually knew what he looked like – or any of the other Frumentarii, because they covered their eyes, mainly, but also their lower faces. That way, they could go incognito whenever they needed to, and nestle their way into almost any organization or fraction, completely unnoticed. As long as she just made sure to cover her eyes and lower face, people wouldn’t actually know what she looked like. They wouldn’t know who she was or who she had been. Not even the legionaries she might run into on her way to Primm would be able to recognize her, unless she had the great misfortune of finding herself face to face with Vulpes Inculta.  
She had seen the posters in Vegas, she had heard what the NCR soldiers said about her first husband. He was a monster, a sadistic madman and Caesar’s strategic mastermind, having committed mass murder on several occasions. His latest strike of evil genius and unorthodox warfare had been the massacre of the NCR camp Searchlight. He had covered the entire camp in radioactive waste, sacrificing his own soldiers along with the hundreds of NCR soldiers who died or turned into ghouls. Ivy had to admit, looking at it from a neutral point of view, only regarding the unconventional warfare, it was a work of art.  
She did, however, pray to every god she possibly could name, that she wouldn’t run into Vulpes out in the desert. He would recognize her no matter how much she tried to disguise herself. It didn’t matter, because he knew her every fiber – he knew her better than she knew herself. She had been his experimental pet and the love of his life, if he was a man you could say possessed such an ability of emotional intricacy. _He did_ , she was smart enough to know he did – she might not have matched her first husband's sheer quota of intelligence or logical thinking, but she was far from stupid. Benny, was stupid – and he wasn’t even dumb in any kind of way. What made Benny stupid, was the fact that he was so goddamn impulsive and such an obvious…tribal. Benny had never been the great mind behind anything, he was a glorified thug who’d played all his cards right thus far. Ivy hoped he would continue to play his cards right, because she wanted to stay with Benny. He might not possess the alarmingly excellent and quite frankly, scary, mind of Vulpes, but at least he wasn’t a madman. He didn’t go on murderous rampages or have homicidal fits four times a year. He was secure in a calm and comfortable way, a way she could really get used to.  
_Please, I beg you, lady Fortuna, let me stay with Benny and just give us a comfortable life together. Give me the strength and duration so that I can come back home again_. Ara Fortunae Reducis.

***

“So, you’s lookin’ to work as a courier, are ya?” said the old man who’d introduced himself as Johnson Nash, standing behind the counter, looking at her with what he probably deemed as a sensible amount of skepticism.  
“Yep, need the caps, ya dig?” Ivy tried to sound as inconspicuous as she could, but at usual, she should just learn not to try to sound different – it never worked.  
“Uh…Yar”, he old man snorted and spit some chewed tobacco behind the counter, which made Ivy wince. “Well, little lady, yer in luck. We be needin’ us some knew couriers, can ya start t’day?”  
“Yeah, no problem”, Ivy nodded, “Whatever you need”  
“Then let’s start off with yer name ‘n all them formalities. State yer given name, surname, maiden name if yer married, age, place of birth, former occupation, language skills ‘n eventual known diseases”  
“Diseases? Whaddya need to know that for?”  
“Ain’t no decision of mine, ya hear, it’s them NCR forcin’ us to gather up information ‘bout known diseases. Ya know what they say, don’t shoot the messenger ‘an all that”, the old man spluttered while the tobacco ran from his mouth down into his beard. Was he drunk as well? It was certainly a possibility.  
“All right, let’s see here. Remind me if I forget anything you need to know, yeah?”  
“Sure, little lady”, Mr. Nash chuckled.  
“Name’s Ivy Henderson, my maiden name is Phoenix, I’m 20 years old – born in 2261, somewhere in Arizona but I don’t know exactly where since my tribe was slaughtered by Legion forces when I was very young. Uh…what else did you need to know? Oh yeah, I’ve worked as a receptionist in New Reno, other than that I’ve taken up small jobs here and there while travelling. I’ve spent the last two years on the road but spent some time in Vegas recently just resting from the road”  
“Huh, I see”, the man scribbled down some notes on a worn piece of paper. “How’s about yer language skills ‘n them diseases?”  
“English and some Spanish, and no known diseases”  
“I don’t get it me’self why the damned NCR’s so persistent with them questions about diseases, ain’t nobody gonna answer ‘em straight anyhow”, the old man mumbled under his breath as he went over his notes. “Spanish ye says? How come?”  
“Learned it on the road”  
“Uh huh, good, good”, he nodded. “Ye have a current residential address, or somewhere to send yer things if you’s wind up in the dirt?”  
“Pardon?” Ivy’s eyes twitched before her mind even had the time to react and control her body’s reactions.  
“A resi-den-tial address?” Mr. Nash repeated, clarifying the words as if Ivy was retarded.  
“Uh, no, not really. I know a guy at the Tops Casino in Vegas, I guess you could send my things there, if there’s anything to send”  
“The Tops Casino… In New Vegas”, he wrote down, “Any particular name? You’s given a maiden name, but ain’t mentioned a husband”  
“My husband’s dead. Tell them at the Tops to give my shit to B, they’ll know who he is and if they don’t, ain’t like I own much”  
“If ye say so”, he sighed. “Oh well, that’s all done then. This here’s a package that needs deliverin’ up to the Mojave Outpost by t’morrow. Here’s yer map and ye can grab the necessary foodstuff ye’ll need for the road. Me own recommendation’s takin’ a few cans o’ Pork’n Beans. Hearty but goes down cold as well ‘n it’ll keep ye goin’”  
“All right”, Ivy nodded and took the package and map that Mr. Nash had put on the counter for her and then walked over the large shelf containing food, water and other edibles. “Thanks, see you in a few days”

***

Ivy had worked for the Mojave Express for a month and a half when she was notified as one of the couriers transporting six different packages on different routes to New Vegas, apparently Benny had come through, as she was stamped down in Johnson Nash’s books as Courier Six. She was given the small package and then the map over her route, marking out a strange back-way from Primm, through Goodsprings, behind the Black Mountains and then straight towards New Vegas from there. She shrugged and put the package in her pack that she carried over her shoulder along with her caravan shotgun, knowing that Benny would meet her in Goodsprings in three days time, she needn’t care about the marked out route.

Just as she had done before heading out on the other rounds, she collected some things for the road, stocking up on clean water and then she headed out, walking past the large roller-coaster and towards Goodsprings.  
So far in her travels, beginning from Vegas, she had been lucky. She had only run into small assassination squads of legionaries and they left her alone, Caesar’s Legion didn’t touch couriers or caravans, considering they were just as dependent on them as the NCR. Certainly, Caesar got much of his supplies sent to Fortification Hill from Arizona, but they bought some things from the Nevada merchants moving all across the Mojave.  
The only things she had trouble with during the travelling, where the same things that had bothered her when she made her way up north two years ago – raiders and predators. There was always the odd thief or drugged up idiot, but they were easily handled with a swift strike from her knife. The raiders however, were more difficult, since they moved in groups. It didn’t really matter that they were disorganized and banged up on jet, psycho or whatever chems it was they took these days – if they were a group, it would be more difficult for her to take them down. But she managed, as she always had. She had learned how to use stimpaks if she got shot and she could stitch herself up with some help of local anesthesia until she could reach a small settlement where she usually could get some help. 

As she reached Goodsprings, she had walked through a sandstorm and she had dressed herself up in a leather coat to protect her arms from the whipping winds blowing sand in every direction. She had needed to take off her Stetson and wear it hanging from her back, as it kept flying off her when she walked and she was too busy keeping her coat closed and her shotgun secured, to keep track of her Stetson. A military scarf covered her face and she wore road goggles over her eyes as she entered the small town. Her long, wavy and curling hair had tousled in the wind, becoming completely blown through with sand and dust, she could feel sprigs sticking into her scalp from the tumbleweeds flying through the air, breaking up and getting stuck in everything and anything.  
She walked into what she guessed was the towns only bar and eventual guesthouse – the Prospector Saloon. The first thing that met her inside the Saloon was a white haired bearded old man who sat in a rocking chair just inside the door, murmuring lowly to himself, spitting tobacco and nursing what looked like moonshine. He looked up at her as she entered, but just grunted and went back to his humming.  
Ivy pulled down her road goggles and scarf, shaking out the worst dust and sprigs from her hair and walked into what seemed to be the bar. There, a woman stood behind the bar and she immediately introduced herself to Ivy as Trudy. She was a harsh-spoken and direct woman, but had a kind way about her and Ivy sat down at the bar to wait for Benny to show up. She asked Trudy if someone from out of town had been by recently, but she said that because of the sandstorm, the roads had been calm and the last time they had an outsider visiting was the week before last. 

It was way past midnight when Benny showed up, in the company of four tribals she didn’t recognize. The storm had eased off outside and Benny was dressed as usual in a chequered jacket and a slim pair of grey slacks.  
“Hey baby doll, been waiting long?” he smiled and lit a cigarette, standing beside her and leaned in to kiss her. Ivy noticed something about him was off, he looked strained and weary, his eyes were empty. Had something gone wrong? Ivy frowned and looked at him.  
“Is something the matter, Benny?” she asked as he sucked on his cigarette, leaning against the bar.  
“What? Of course not babe, just glad to see ya, ‘tis all”, _liar_ , Ivy thought. “So, you have everything with you, yeah?”  
“’Course”, Ivy nodded.  
“Good girl”, Benny smiled and kissed her again before he looked up and around the bar, waving at Trudy. “Hey lady, can I get something strong over here?”  
“Sure”, Trudy looked at Benny with skeptical eyes, “Whaddya want?”  
“Aw heck, just gimme some bourbon or whatever you have”, Benny was fidgeting, snapping the filter of his smoke and twitching, constantly making small movements. Something was definitely not right.  
“As you wish”, Trudy nodded and poured up a shot of bourbon that looked more like moonshine from a dirty tub, than actual bourbon for Benny, who reached into his pocket and pulled out some caps.  
“I’ll pay for whatever she’s had as well”, he said and nodded towards Ivy. Trudy looked at him and took the caps, counting them and then began to give more than half of them back to Benny. He waved his hand, “You hold on to them”, he said and downed his bourbon.  
“Hey, Ben”, Ivy said, touching Benny’s lower arm, “What’s the matter, has something gone wrong? You’re freaking me out with all that twitching and shit”  
Benny’s eyes widened for a spell and he cleared his throat, “Nah, don’t worry ‘bout it baby”, he said and gave her a strained smile. “We need to start moving, head back to the city, you dig? Ain’t safe out here”, he said, nudging her arm, “C’mon baby”  
“All right”, Ivy nodded, rising from the stool, “Thank you Trudy, it was nice meeting you”, she smiled towards the barkeep.  
“You too”, Trudy answered, “You’re welcome back anytime” 

When they exited the Saloon, the moon was high in the sky and full – looking as deep and alien as it only ever does out in the desert. During the night, the desert just seems that much lonelier than during the night, the vast expanses of dusty lands and the odd cactus here and there, along with a few other desert plants. Far away in the horizon you could just make out the shining light of New Vegas and Ivy could see the thousands of tiny blinking lights flashing by inside her mind as she followed Benny up towards a hill just outside Goodsprings.  
Before she could even notice it was a graveyard, something hard hit the back of her head and her whole world became black. Inside her, it was just emptiness, a vacuum of sorts from where she could hear scraping noises, thudding and silent chatter, somewhere far away from her.  
When she woke up, she was bound and gaged and four strong arms dragged her up on her knees. She blinked and tried to focus her eyesight as she turned her head from left to right, up and down – on her right side, just behind her, was a deep hole – recently dug up and when she looked up, just across from her – she was met by grey slim slacks and a chequered jacket. Benny’s eyes looked hollowed, they were still deeply brown and his skin still looked like bronze in the light of the moon – but his expression was emotionless.  
In his right hand she saw Maria, and he clutched her tight as he reached his arm out and pointed the barrel to Ivy’s head. Her eyes widened when she realized what he was doing, he was killing her. She had run across half the Mojave, being scared of a man in red armor, when the true danger had been the man posing as her savior. 

But it didn’t matter now, nothing mattered anymore. Ivy had abandoned the one man she truly ever loved, in the only true fucked up way you could possibly love a man like Vulpes, she had abandoned her son and her heritage. It was right that the gods would chose to punish her and so she embraced her punishment by entering the gates of Hades with a clear mind. The gods would know what to do with her now; her life was no longer in the hands of mortals.  
“You’ve made your last delivery pussycat. Sorry you got twisted up in this scene. From where you’re kneeling, baby doll, it must seem like an 18-karat run of bad luck. Truth is…the game was rigged from the start”

***

You’re the devil in disguise, oh yes you are – the devil in disguise  
You fooled me with your kisses, you cheated and you schemed  
Heaven knows how you lied to me, you’re not the way you seemed  
You look like an angel, walk like an angel, talk like an angel  
But I got wise,  
You’re the devil in disguise, oh yes you are – the devil in disguise  
I thought that I was in heaven, but I was sure surprised  
Heaven help me, I didn’t see – the devil in your eyes  
\- Elvis Presley ‘The Devil in Disguise’

***


	9. Viva New Vegas

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A warning: Explicit sexual violence.

“You look like you’ve seen a ghost, Benny”, Six turned her head and looked into the chairman’s dark brown eyes. If he wasn’t the bastard who had shot her in the head, she would have almost sworn she felt an attraction towards him.   
“Yeah, that’s one word for it”, Benny mumbled and led Six away from the bar into a corner of the ground floor of the casino that had armchairs and couches. She looked around her shoulder for Vulpes, but again, he was gone and out of sight, which filled her with a hint of worry that she tried to push away, concentrating on Benny instead and the plan Vulpes had explained to her. She needed to trust that he was around there somewhere, constantly looking in case something went wrong. “People normally don’t return from the dead, baby doll. Figures you would though, just my luck, ain’t it?” he said as his arm snaked around her waist in a way that was all too familiar for Six to be comfortable. “Serves me right for using a 9mm”  
“Well, I’m glad you haven’t forgotten me”, Six let a smirk spread across her face, trying to keep her breathing even. Having the man who tried to kill her hold her so close, feeling his warm breath fall over her shoulders unnerved her in a way she couldn’t let on. Benny needed to think she was there to take him out and she needed him to bolt, to escape like the lousy coward of a man that he was – straight into the chains of the Legion. 

“You’re one memorable broad, I’ll give you that Ivy”, Benny laughed nervously. “You here to off me then, baby?”  
“Give me one reason I shouldn’t try”, Six locked eyes with Benny, looking up at his tall figure.   
Benny leaned in close to her ear, “They’re called bodyguards and every one of 'em is packing. Me too, so baby makes five. Add to that every Chairman in this joint is armed, and not with some hold-out peashooter like maybe you smuggled through security”  
“That’s the strange thing, Benny, they didn’t even pad me down when I entered”, Six smiled, raising a brow in question.   
“Why would they?” Benny looked at her in a confused manner. “Ain’t none of my men gonna try to touch my wife, no matter how dead she’s supposed to be”   
At first, Six though she misheard something. His wife? Luckily, she was able to stop herself from saying something before having thought it through.   
“Benny baby”, Six cooed, stroking the collar of his chequered jacket and pressing herself closer to him. She could see his eyes following her perky, red-painted lips, “Why’d you try to kill me, huh?”   
“Hey now, Ivy baby. What are you trying to do?” his arm around her waist tightened, “We could turn this to our advantage, you dig? Just uh…come back to our suite, pussycat”   
“I’m afraid I can’t do that”, Six looked up at Benny through her black, long lashes. She stroked his cheek and stood up on her toes, bringing his ear close to her lips and whispered, “I’m not alone”   
Benny’s eyes widened and he slowly looked around the room, “Whaddya mean?”  
“I was brought here by a legionary, they found me Benny”, Six kept a worried looking face, but inside, she sniggered to herself, this was a stroke of genius. If anything was going to have Benny running, if he truly was the coward Vulpes was certain he was, it would be the infiltration of legionaries in his casino, standing at the ready to kill him at any moment. “When I was tryin’ to find ya, I was taken and now they’re using me to get to you”   
“The fuck, Ivy?” Benny was starting to actually look scared, his smooth charm seemed to trickle off of him as the scenario played before his eyes.   
“You’ve only got this one chance Benny, you need to get out of here”, Six whispered to him as she clutched the jacket’s collar. “I’ll try to stall the legionary, all right?”  
“It is all kinds of wrong, pussycat. Why would I trust anything you say?”   
“I forgive you”, Six whispered close to his lips, “I get why you did it, but I don’t kill my husbands. Do what you gotta do Benny, I don’t care. But you need to get out of here, now”   
“You forgive me? After all I’ve done? Baby, are you tryin’ to make me cry? I don’t know what to say, words don’t begin…”, Benny kissed her and Six did her best not to let on that on the inside, she was not even close to the calm exterior she showed Benny. Vulpes was watching and even though things went surprisingly better than they had first planned, what was Vulpes going to say about this whole thing? She had been married to Benny? What had she been thinking? By Mars, what had she been up to before the man who turned out to be her second husband had shot her in the head? “This spirit of forgiveness you’re showing me…it’s enough to make a player rethink what it means to win. You’re 18 karat, baby – all the way”   
“Just get yourself out of here, far away, yeah?”   
“Don’t need to tell me twice, pussycat”, Benny looked around and before Six could say anything else, he was heading out through a hidden back door, leaving her alone in the corner along with the pre-war armchairs and couches. 

Vulpes had been right, Benny was a coward.

***

Six met Vulpes outside the Tops and he started to lead her away back towards the Ultra-Luxe. His face held an unreadable stoicism that due to the revelations inside the Tops, unnerved Six. She couldn’t remember the kind of man Vulpes had been during their marriage, before she ran away, but she knew he was dangerous and she had no idea how he would react. His calmness was uncanny and she tried to just focus on her breathing at the moment, following the little pushes she could feel Vulpes made to the small of her back as they walked along the Strip and over to the extravagant entrance of the Ultra-Luxe.  
“Hey, Six!”, she could feel Vulpes freeze and she looked up, trying to search after the source of the familiar voice. Then she saw a redheaded woman in a Stetson close in on her and Vulpes with a smile on her face and eyes that told of a steady intake of strong liquor. Cassidy.  
“Cass, hi”, Six swallowed and straightened out her face, putting on a smile and turned to face her.  
“Fancy meeting you here, I was waiting for ya to come by so we could discuss that business we talked about up at the Mojave Outpost”, Cass said and lit a cigarette.  
“Of course”, Six nodded, “I just had some things I needed to take care of, I did tell you about that, didn’t I?”  
“Yeah, of course!” Cass smiled, “I wasna following you anything, I know you had things to do. Just a nice coincidence to meet you here, thought I’d say hi. Oh, but who’s this lovely looking fella?” she eyed Vulpes who stood just behind Six, still with his hand resting on her hip.  
“Where are my manners?”, Vulpes smiled and put on that charming tone in his voice, reaching out his hand towards Cass, “Fox”  
“Fox huh?” Cass smirked, batting her lashes a bit too obviously, “Rose of Sharon Cassidy”, she shook his hand.  
“A pleasure, miss Rose”  
“Just Cass, please”, Cass cooed, biting on the philter of her cigarette and Vulpes nodded politely.  
“Well, it was a lovely surprise seeing you Cass”, Six said and put a hand on Vulpes’ upper arm, “But we have to go, we have some business to conclude, Mr. Fox and I”  
“Yeah, sure”, Cass smirked, “I understand. See you soon, yeah?” she winked towards them both and then walked off.  
“Nice woman”, Vulpes said under his breath, “Pity she’s a drunk”  
“Right”, Six sighed as they stepped in to the foyer of the Ultra-Luxe.

“You fucking married that sleazy degenerate?” Vulpes snarled as soon as the door to his suite closed behind them. Before Six could even react, his hand was in her hair, throwing her against the bar making her yelp from chock. The face that just a second ago had been calm and stoic, had turned tense and his eyes looked like the eyes of a lunatic, almost glowing in the dim light inside the suite, as he moved towards her. He pulled her up from the floor and dragged her away to the couches, throwing her harshly over the back of one, grabbing her throat tightly. His nails dug into her skin and she thought she could feel her skin breaking under his grip. “ _Ivy Zeigel_ , huh?” he laughed in a way that made Six shiver to the very core of her being, “Do you know what the punishment for females are, spreading their legs for someone else but their owner?”   
Six didn’t say anything, she was too scared to even get a word out of her throat, she had trouble enough trying to push air down her lungs, what with Vulpes clasping her airways shut through his strong grip.   
“Listen to me, you whore”, he snarled through clenched teeth, his lips curled back like a mad animal, “You should be glad our marriages are unable to be annulled. According to the law of Caesar, a marriage is for life unless the man, not the fucking whore of a woman, but the man – the owner, says otherwise. The law of the Legion does not recognize the sham of a little joyride you had with that profligate fuck. You are _my_ property Aurelia”, his breathing was heavy and she could feel the tears starting to run down her cheeks as she could only witness the rabid monster standing above her, snarling and spitting. “It is my name that you wear on your back, that makes you _mine_ and nothing in this world can ever change that. There’s nothing, _nothing_ , you can do to run away from that fact, you understand me, _wife_?” 

Six just stared at him with wide eyes, paralyzed within his grip and the raw anger that pulsed out from his every fiber.   
“ _Answer me_!” he bellowed, punching her over her cheekbone and eye with a balled up fist and Six squealed like a hurt animal, sobbing as her eyesight went dim from the strike.   
“Y…Yes, husband”, she stammered quietly.   
“Why, Aurelia, do you keep making this so fucking hard for me, huh? Why do you force me to punish you?” he growled, flipping her over so her back was turned to him, her face pushed down into the fabric of the couch. “You really have no idea, do you?” he chuckled viciously, but there was a hopelessness in the way his vocal chords formed the sounds from his low laughter. “By the time I’m done with you, my love, you’ll never dare look at another man again” 

With a hard tug to her hair, he forced himself inside her, fucking her violently in silence as Six wept. It burned within her, but she didn’t know if the burning was because of her own pain or the pain she knew was within her husband as he ravished her. He pierced her flesh with his manhood and she didn’t even try to wriggle or squirm her way out from his grip – there was no point. Perhaps she didn’t deserve this, or perhaps she did, she couldn’t tell, instead she tried to tune out, focusing her thoughts on Atticus. Tried to pretend that the hard pounding of Vulpes forcing himself inside her, was the demanding but gentle touches he’d given her last night.   
Suddenly he stopped and she hoped to the gods that he was finished, that the punishment was over – her face was sore and in the forceful way he had entered her, her sex was sore. But then a whole other pain cut through her and she couldn’t hold back the scream rapturing through her throat. It felt as if she was being torn apart with such a raw physical force she was certain he was trying to kill her. Then he pulled her up from the couch by her hair and pressed her against him, chocking her with his other hand.   
“You’re mine, Lupa, I’ll make sure you never forget that again”, he whispered in her ear as he pushed inside her, holding her whole body up from her hair and the chocking grip on her throat. Her legs had given up and she could feel something warm trickling down the back of her thighs as he kept violating her, pounding into her sore flesh. 

Six lost track of time, the pain was so overwhelming she couldn’t even think anymore. It was impossible for her to even try to think about something else, at least not until the pain numbed out, but with every new push from Vulpes, the pain felt raw, new and it was forcing her cries and before she even realized it herself, she was begging Vulpes to stop, crying and shaking, promising him she’d do anything. Then the hand that prevented her from breathing properly tightened and soon, the world around her became black. Vanished. 

Before her, she saw a small bundle with dark brown hair – a thick thatch of almost black hair. Its skin was so pale and soft, shining like only the skin of a newly born can shine and then she knew. It was Atticus. Then a small boy with the same dark, almost black hair wobbled past her, laughing and running around in a small red tunic, chasing something and laughing happily. What was he chasing? She tried to call out to the little boy but he ignored her, instead his large dark blue eyes followed the thing he was chasing. His large, chunky cheeks were pink and healthy as he skipped around and then Six could she two large hands grabbing him, lifting him up and then she saw Vulpes. He was smiling as he spoke something to the little boy, holding him up against his hip and tickling the boy on his stomach. The boy laughed in such a joyous way, sounding like water pouring and Vulpes smiled and kissed the boy, before he tousled his thick dark hair. 

Six woke up with a scream. She was covered in something warm…and wet. Her body ached like she’d been thrown off a cliff and as soon as she tried to move, strong arms clutched her in an embrace. She looked around her and realized she was in a bathroom, the white tiles meeting her eyes and she could hear the silent buzzing from the electric lights above the bathroom mirror. She tried to turn around, but the arms held her in place.   
“Try to be still, my love”, the velvety voice spoke from behind her. “You need to heal, your punishment has made your body sore, but you took it like a true woman”   
“What happened?”, Six asked, confused and hazy from just waking up. She tried to move just a little, but the pain shooting up from her backside and rear made her whine.   
“I punished you”, he said with ease, as if it was the most natural and obvious answer in the world, stroking her chest with his wet fingers, placing a light kiss behind her ear. “It needed to be done, but it’s over now Aurelia. Now you need to rest”   
Vulpes sat behind her in the tub, holding her body back against his own, resting her back against his chest as he cupped a hand and washed her with the warm water surrounding them.   
“How long was I out for?” Six asked, deciding it was best to just relax and lean back against his chest, trying to stay as still as possible.   
“Not long, half an hour at most”, his voice spoke softly. “You need to rest now, we’re going home tomorrow. Alerio sent word, they apprehended Benny just outside Freeside and they’re transporting him to the Fort, to Caesar”   
“All right”, Six answered and let her head drop back against Vulpes’ shoulder. He kissed her throat gently and let his nose stroke her jawline.   
“I love you, Aurelia”, he whispered softly.   
“And I you, Vulpes”, she answered, reaching up to touch his arm holding her closer to him.

***

The following day, she was dressed up in normal travelling clothes by Vulpes and he himself dressed in cargo pants and a simple t-shirt. Her body ached and she wasn’t sure if she would be able to walk properly for a longer amount of time – but he told her not to be worried. ‘I’ll carry you if need be, but I doubt it will be necessary, we’ll make a few stops on the way’, he said.  
The trip to Cottonwood Cove would take four days if they went slow and then it took them a couple of hours more to cross the Colorado, getting them to the Fort. Alerio and Cato were a day’s travel ahead of them, but they were possibly moving faster and would be at the Fort in two days. Vulpes didn’t seem worried, however, he was in a good mood as he packed their things and stocked up on water and edibles.

Six was given a knife and a 9mm pistol, Vulpes obviously trusting her enough to let her carry weapons. Or he trusted himself well enough to think he could disarm her within seconds, if she even began to try something she wasn’t allowed. She didn’t doubt he could. 

They walked out of the Ultra-Luxe and then the Strip without running into anyone else, it was still very early in the morning and aside from a few tourists and still drunk soldiers, this was the calmest time on the Strip. The more Six walked, the more numb her body felt and Vulpes had been right, it became easier and easier to move and walk. She supposed he if anyone would know, he must have marched quite a few times, with wounds from battle, seeing as he’d probably been a legionary most of his life. 

The first night they camped in a small cave just south of Vegas and they took turns in staying awake. Six was allowed to sleep for the longest, while Vulpes watched the area around them, as she was still hurting. Her husband was surprisingly good at cooking, she found out. He had shot a gecko just beneath the cave and he later prepared a stew from it with jalapeños, beer and some herbs he was carrying. The food was actually some of the better she had eaten in a long time and the heat from the jalapeño let out endorphins within her and warmed her stomach, as the temperature in the desert dropped with the setting sun.   
“Have you always been able to cook like this?” she asked her husband who sat across the small fire, cutting the rest of the meat into thin strips, possibly to preserve it by smoking it before the morning.   
“Not always, but I learned it along the way”, he smirked. “Good food keeps morale up, you know”   
“I can imagine”, Six nodded. “Do you cook at home, as well?”   
“No, very seldom”, he said and flattened out the strips of meat on a large flat stone, tenderizing the meat by thumping it with the butt of his knife. “We have slaves for that, since you’re a complete disaster in the kitchen”, he chuckled silently.   
“I am?” Six looked up.   
“Yes”, Vulpes snorted with amusement. “You can’t even fry an egg without accidentally stabbing yourself”   
“Seriously?”   
“I’m very serious. You couldn’t cook something edible even if your life depended on it. You’re better at other things”  
“Like?”  
“Reading, wielding weapons”, Vulpes smirked, “You enjoy painting, you used to do that a lot, and minding our garden in Flagstaff. You had a large vegetable patch where you grew tomatoes, peppers and chili-peppers”   
“Our house, what’s it like?”   
“I don’t know, we used to live in a bungalow just up the hill above the city center. But just after you ran off and I was made praefectus, I was granted an officer’s villa. I still haven’t had time to see it, I did make sure they moved all our things there, and your crops”   
“Thank you, I guess?” Six smiled softly.   
“Don’t thank me until you’ve seen it. I have no idea what it looks like, myself. Might be a rat’s nest for all I know”, he smirked.   
“I look forward to seeing it, nevertheless”, Six nodded as she scooped some more stew into her mouth.   
“Good”, Vulpes nodded.

***


	10. Bad, Bad Benny

Cottonwood Cove was situated in a just that – a cove, protected by steep hills on all sides and the Colorado in between. Legionaries meticulously patrolled the few small roads leading down to Cottonwood from up the hills and down below, the camp spread out over a vast area. It was a huge camp and the red tents littered the surprisingly green ground just at the water’s edge. On their way down to the center of the encampment, Six tried to count the tents, but had to give up when she reached over 50.   
Close to the water on the east side of the camp, Six saw cages and pens and in them people stood and sat, dressed in what looked like rags – if they were dressed at all. As she walked into the camp besides Vulpes, the only ones who looked at her where men, the few women she saw, cast their eyes down into the ground as soon as she looked their way. They looked beaten up, dirty and all of them were unnaturally skinny, wearing torn cloth that looked more like sacks than actual clothes. They had large red x’s painted on their chests and backs.   
“Are those women slaves?” she whispered to Vulpes and snaked her arm around his elbow.   
“All women are slaves, Aurelia”, Vulpes nodded. “You used to be just like them once”   
“How come I’m not like that…now?”   
“I married you”, he answered without emotion. 

“Ave, Vulpes Inculta, true to Caesar”, a man walked towards them and saluted Vulpes with a raised arm.   
“True to Caesar”, Vulpes answered, raising only his hand in salutation. “Decanus Severus, any news?   
“Alerio and Cato arrived two days ago with a prisoner, transporting him to the Fort”, the masked decanus answered. He wore a black and red-feathered helmet, road goggles and had a cloth wrapped around his face, like many of he other legionaries she had seen had. Though, she hadn’t seen a helmet like that before.   
“He was alive, I presume?” Vulpes frowned.   
“Yes, at least when he came through here”, the decanus nodded.   
“Good. Where’s Aurelius?” Vulpes asked.   
“In his office, sir”   
“Thank you, Severus”, Vulpes nodded and the decanus saluted him again before turning to leave. 

Six’s almost cramp-like hold of Vulpes elbow seemed to have started to annoy him and so he removed her hand from him and pushed her to walk slightly in front of him instead, so he could guide her by pushing lightly on the small of her back.   
“Where are we going?” Six asked.   
“I have a uniform inside the main building here, I need to fetch it before we leave for the Fort. We should also try to eat something. Be careful about the meat though”   
“What? Why?”, Six glowered.   
“Just don’t eat it, Aurelia, better to be safe than sorry”   
“Uh, all right”, she shrugged, biting her lip.   
They entered the building and Vulpes was greeted by some legionaries as they walked through a couple of rooms, until he stopped and started rooting around in an old locker.   
“Oh, you’re going to wear that dog’s head, aren’t you?” Six looked at him.   
“It’s my uniform”, Vulpes smirked and cocked a brow, looking amused. “You don’t like it?”   
“I didn’t say that”, Six crossed her arms over her chest, “But isn’t it strange to walk around with a skinned mutt on your head?”   
“You don’t think it suits me? I’ve heard the 'mutt' makes me look rather…dashing”, he looked amused, “Or at least that’s what some young girls in Vegas said, as they stood and admired the posters they’ve decorated the entire NCR embassy with”   
Six couldn’t help but to laugh, somewhat carefully of course, but nevertheless a laugh. 

“Inculta, I hope you’re planning on lashing that insubordinate daughter of mine to a cross”, a dark and strong voice sounded from behind Six, which it made her jump.   
“Aurelius”, Vulpes acknowledged the man walking into the room, dressed in a hefty metallic armor with the largest galea on his head that Six had ever seen.  
The man Vulpes had called ‘Aurelius’ grabbed Six’s chin and looked down on her. He was tall, even taller with the galea on his head, which made him practically tower over her. “I hope these bruises are from your hand”, he mumbled as he let go of her chin and then began to completely ignore her presence.   
“Yes”, Vulpes answered through tightly held jaws. “She’s been punished and is being brought home to resume her duties”   
“You’re keeping her?” the man looked irritated. Who was he? Had he referred to her as his daughter? Six froze, how many surprises could she possibly take in, before she died from pure shock or just plain horror?   
Vulpes nodded.   
“It’s your loss”, Aurelius grunted. “Your heading out for the Fort today?”   
“We'll eat, but then leave”, Vulpes answered and strapped on his lorica segmentata, “Aurelia, fasten it in the back” he said and Six moved behind her husband and worked on the straps. She had no idea how they were supposed to be fastened, but her fingers seemed to know and so she decided it had to be good enough. 

Aurelius called for a slave who quickly came running, and ordered for a dinner to be prepared in his office for the three of them. “Have them prepare bighorn, Vulpes is picky when it comes to his meats”, the man grunted and then nodded to Vulpes before leaving. 

When Six was alone again with Vulpes, she figured it was safe for her to speak again.   
“That’s my father?”   
“Yes”   
“He doesn’t seem very…uh, fatherly”, Six looked over her shoulder, as if suddenly paranoid the large man would jump back in and try to smother her.   
“No, he’s your father through birth, only”, he said and drew Six close, kissing her forehead. “Let’s get you cleaned up. Also, someone should have a look at how your rectum is healing. I’ll try to find you a toga or something proper for later”  
Vulpes led Six out and towards a tent that was occupied by a smaller group of female slaves. In the tent, Six saw that a few wounded legionaries was resting and she assumed it was a sick tent. She was right. Vulpes ordered two of the slaves to clean her and also check her physical health, shamelessly detailing the damage she had obtained four days ago. The detailing made Six blush and she felt as if the bowed down glances of the slaves pierced her even though they didn't dare to look at her in Vulpes presence. 

After going through even more humiliation by being scrubbed by slaves and then having to bend over a table, while an older woman peeked in between her buttocks, assessing the condition of whatever had happened there, she was declared as ‘fine’. The old woman said that the damaged skin around her anal had healed all right and that she could soothe the pain by applying a salve that she gave her, twice a day. 

The dinner with her father, the centurion Aurelius of Phoenix was scarier than anything. Scary in the way that the only time Aurelius looked at her, it was with eyes that looked more homicidal than anything else she'd seen before. Suddenly she felt very thankful towards Vulpes who had taken her away from that monster sitting across from her at the table. Six had tried to ask Vulpes before the dinner what had happened to her mother, but he only answered that she had died when Six was a girl. When she asked how, he ignored her. Perhaps it was best not to know, with a father like Aurelius, Six could imagine that sometimes, ignorance was bliss. 

The boat ride to the Fort took a few hours and when they finally arrived, the sun hadn’t gone up yet. Vulpes guessed that it was about 2 a.m. in the morning, considering there was till quite a few legionaries up and about around the camp.   
Fortification Hill was an even larger military fortification than Cottonwood Cove and it spread out over a hill with water on all sides of the large camp. It took Vulpes and her almost an hour to reach the center of the camp, where she eventually was led into a large tent that had two rooms. Inside there was an actual bed in the inner room with a few crates and quite a few books strewn out over the crates and the bed. In the larger room that was the first room you came into as you entered the tent, there was a large desk with several maps splayed out and weighed down by rocks and old pre-war weights. Other than that, a small low table surrounded by pillows and cloths could be found in the larger room – and of course, more books. She had never seen this many books all at the same time, they were everywhere inside the tent. Figures why Vulpes was as sharp as he was.   
This was home. _Home_. 

Vulpes turned on a gas-lamp in the bedroom and let the tent flap down, closing their bedroom around them.   
“We lived here?” Six asked, looking at Vulpes as he settled on the edge of the bed and started to pull the straps up on his armor. “You, me and Atticus?”   
“Yes”, he answered.   
“Was it this tent, this very tent that I left?”   
“It was, I haven’t changed much about it”   
Six fell down on her knees before Vulpes, where he sat on the bed and she took his hands, kissed his knuckles and squeezed them. “I’m sorry”   
Vulpes was silent and just looked at her.   
“I’m sorry, Vulpes”, she said again. “I wish I could have it undone, that’s not possible, but I…I want to stay with you. I’m sorry, about everything. I can’t even begin to imagine what I must have been thinking”   
“It’s all right, Aurelia. I have forgiven you”, Vulpes said and stroked her hair, looking down on her with searching eyes. “But you do understand that it’ll take some time for me to trust you, yes?”   
Six nodded, looking down at her hands.   
Vulpes reached into a box just beside the bed and took out what looked like a thick metal necklace and a small control of sorts.   
“Do you know what this is?” he asked her.   
Six shook her head, looking confused.   
“It’s a collar”, he said and quickly put a number into the small control, making the collar open up. He then reached for her neck and pulled away her hair, before closing the collar around her neck and throat. It was tight, too tight, she had trouble breathing and she almost gaged from the pressure again her. “It’s what we use on all our captures and slaves that hasn’t yet been broken down. If you try to take it off or escape from this encampment, the collar will explode, decapitating you in the process”   
Six couldn’t believe what she was hearing. Had she not proved to him that she was loyal to him? She had taken her punishment, he had even seemed proud about her submitting to it without a fight. Why was he doing this to her?   
“After I’ve taken care of Benny, I will have some work that I need to do away from here and you will stay put, until I see fit. Until I know you can be trusted, you will wear this collar and know this, Atticus may be alive, but if you try to kill yourself by setting off your collar, I will kill him too”   
“Why…Vulpes? Why are you doing this?” Six stammered quietly under her breath.   
“I gave you freedom once, look what you did with it, Aurelia. I’ve given you another chance – usually there are no second chances. But I’m giving you one, because I love you and I want you to be the wife you’re supposed to be, the mother you’re supposed to be. Don’t disappoint me this time” Vulpes nodded tentatively and looked deeply into her eyes. “Hm? Do you understand?”   
“Yes, husband”, Six answered in a small voice.   
“Good. Now, let’s get some sleep. Tomorrow’s going to be an eventful day, I’m certain”

***

Except for that slave collar around her neck, Ivy looked almost royal as she stood posted besides that bastard, Vulpes Inculta, who seemed to have claimed her for his own. Benny guessed that’s how it worked within the Legion, it didn’t matter whom she belonged to, to begin with, if someone superior saw something he wanted. The bullets she had taken to her head hadn’t damaged her looks what so ever, she was still as beautiful as she had been the first time he saw her in New Reno, with her long wild and dark hair and her large blue eyes. Her eyes became even more pronounced by the midnight blue dress she was wearing, was that even a dress by the way? Looked more like a sheet, dyed deeply blue. Still, she looked like Benny had always imagined the old roman gods in all her simplicity. She had been given jewelry, several heavy bracelets that she wore around her wrists and ankles, together with sandals that showed off her small but strangely soft feet.  
Her face was almost as stoic as the face of the cocksucker standing next to her. Caesar looked bored, just like he had three days ago when Benny had been dragged into the camp by the two Latin-speaking idiots that had caught him just outside of Freeside. The dictator drawled when he spoke, sounding so arrogant Benny had to suppress his nervous twitching just from the sound of his voice.

Mostly, Benny had noticed, the common soldiers spoke English, but as soon as he had arrived within the confides of Caesar, everyone started to speak Latin. It seemed only the higher ups within the Legion spoke Latin and it was annoying him, since he couldn’t understand what Caesar and that bastard with the dog on his head were saying. The other officer, who Benny thought was named Lucius, was smirking. Ivy remained quiet, until Caesar looked at her and spoke, then she looked up at Inculta who nodded and then she looked back at Caesar before answering in what sounded like flowing Latin. Benny had known she had been a slave and married off to a legionary at some point, but he had no idea she was fluent in their language.   
Then Caesar’s attention was focused on him were he was kneeling in the open-walled tent a few feet to the side from the dictators dais. 

“Benny Zeigel, boss of the New Vegas Chairmen family”, Caesar said with his broad Californian accent. “Not only are you an infamous mobster and a degenerate, but you also took the property of one of my highest ranking officers for yourself, desecrated it and then tried to have that property killed”  
Benny looked at Ivy and swallowed thickly, his mouth had all of a sudden become dry – not that it hadn’t been dry before since it was almost 24 hours since he last had something to drink, but the whole situation that played out before him right now just felt unreal. Like it wasn’t really happening.  
“Perhaps you were not aware that Aurelia Inculta of Phoenix, or as you better know her, Ivy, is the wife of the first of my Frumentarii, Vulpes Inculta, having married over six years past. She is also the daughter of one of my most efficient centurions, Aurelius of Phoenix. Due to her status as a married women of a Legion officer and the mother of his son, it is a severe crime against the empire for a profligate to try and have such a woman killed”  
“Aw c’mon Ivy”, Benny groaned, but she didn’t even look at him. “At least I looked at you, didn’t I? I looked you in the eye, I wasn’t dishonest”   
“ _Silence_!” Caesar roared and then said something in Latin to Ivy who then again looked first at Vulpes before nodding carefully towards Caesar. Then Ivy looked up and over at him and her eyes were glowing as they stared straight at him and suddenly she looked more alive than Benny had ever seen her, and it scared him. It scared him bad. 

Ivy walked towards him, lifting up her long dark dress slightly, her jewelry clinking as she moved closer to him. Then she stopped silent before him, looking down at him, in his mind he couldn’t help remembering when he had stood on his knees before her and kissed her naked body, swirled his tongue in between her lush thighs and up her moist cunt.   
“We had a good run, didn’t we, honey baby?” he said and glanced up at her.   
“Did we? I can’t remember”, she answered dryly, looking anything but amused.   
Benny looked to her side and saw that all three men was watching them intently. “Don’t be like that, Ivy. Some things turned out as you wanted, at least. Sure, things went sideways, but here you are – and here I am, and you get to kill me with your bare hands if you wish to. Just as you told me you would”   
“I have no memory of saying any such thing”, now she smirked for some strange reason. “I will, however, not kill you”   
“No? It was the truth then, that you forgive me?”   
Ivy chuckled, letting out a hollow but soft sound that made the hair stand on Benny’s neck. “Forgive?” she said and looked back over her shoulder and Benny saw Vulpes arch a brow in question towards her. “I do not understand this notion, Mr. Zeigel, that you are referring to. Forgiveness?”   
“Naw, c’mon. Now you’re just being cruel here”, Benny was sweating.   
“How does one forgive two bullets to the skull? How does one forgive the loss of a lifetime of memories? How does one forgive being forced to suffer through Hades and then being pulled back into the world of the living?” she said without showing any emotions. “Tell me, Mr. Zeigel, have you regrets?”   
“I think you can guess”, Benny murmured.   
“I think not”, Ivy answered.   
“I shouldn’t have tried to kill you, it was a sin. You were my wife”   
“I was never any such thing, Benny”, finally she almost sounded like the Ivy he had gotten to know, when she said his name. “I wish for you to suffer, therefore I leave your fate in the hands of my Lord and my husband. I hope they feed your half-dead corpse to the mongrels, you cowardly waste of a man”  
She said all of that with the utmost dry calmness, as if she was ordering food at a restaurant or telling a storeowner what was on her shopping-list. 

“Imperator Caesar mi”, Ivy said in that strange language, as she fell to her knees in front of the dictator, taking one of his hands and kissing it both on the outside and inside until he touched her chin with his fingers and smiled down on her. Benny couldn’t understand what the dictator said to her, but she nodded pliantly, which seemed completely out of person for Ivy. She was never pliant, never this calm – she never simply nodded. But there she was, with one of their bomb collars around her throat, even though she seemed to be more loyal than a well-trained dog. The daughter of a centurion, _fuck_ , the wife of a Legion officer, _double-fuck_ , the wife of Vulpes Inculta – a maniac and a mass-murderer, _fuck, fuck, fuck_.

“I sentence you to 40 lashes and then whatever death Inculta finds suitable for you”, Caesar said in a drawling voice. Benny’s eyes widened as he saw the smirk on Inculta’s lips. When he looked over at Ivy, she was staring down into the ground again, she was probably not allowed to look anywhere else unless she was told to. The silent one, Lucius laughed at something and Inculta nodded, still smirking, before saluting Caesar with a raised arm. Ivy made a curtsy and then left the tent, as Inculta walked towards him. 

Before Benny knew what would happen next, he was whipped over the face with a pistol that almost had him flying to the ground.   
“I hope you’ve taken it up the ass before, you degenerate scum, I’m throwing you to the starved recruits as soon as your back is whipped raw. Enjoy”, Vulpes snarled before turning to leave.

***


	11. Fox on the Run

_6 months later_  
During the preparations for the second battle of the dam, things calmed down for Six, she had drawn back and settled in as Vulpes wife at the Fort. Vulpes had been busy with work in and around New Vegas, tying alliances between the Legion and the different tribes and families, which according to him, had gone rather well. Securing the Platinum Chip from Benny had let them in to the bunker under the weather station in the middle of the Fort, there, Six had helped Caesar blow all the securitrons up and after that, it was simply the small task of completely wiping out Mr. House.   
Vulpes had entered the Lucky 38 through the sewers together with two other legionaries and fought his way to the control central of the 38, finding there, a pre-war man than was more a corpse being technically animated and kept alive, than anything else. Neither Veronica nor Boone had been present at the casino when Vulpes came through and when he relayed it to Six later, she was thankful of that fact, even though she hadn’t known the two for long, they had been her friends and she didn’t want them hurt. Loyalty was a strange thing, wasn’t it? If Six wasn’t completely off the rails, Boone wouldn’t waist a second to put a bullet in her head if he knew she had up and left, returning to her estranged Legion husband of her own free will. The fact that she received a bomb collar as soon as she arrived at the Fort, hadn’t done anything to change the fact that she had gone to Vulpes willingly. She no longer needed the collar, really, she was intent on staying – where else would she go? 

Whenever she started to feel a hint of doubt, she imagined that happy picture that had flashed before her that one time – of Atticus running around, playing, happy as if nothing was wrong with the world around them. And Vulpes picking him up, holding him and kissing him, like a proud father. That is what Six longed for, that picture was the embodiment of what she wanted back – what she had taken away from herself and what Benny had stolen. Before, she at least had the memories in tact, even though she had left, but now – she had one memory, only the one that she could clearly see in her mind. Vulpes had told her about so many others, but it was hard for her to think of them and distinguish whether they were real or not. 

Six sat in her armchair, reveling in the sun just outside her tent with a hand resting just under her growing stomach. She had been able to start to feel the baby kick and bob around inside its little nest in her stomach. When she first had understood that she was pregnant, she had been scared. But Vulpes reacted with joy, or at least what passed as joy for him, considering he kept himself rather restrained, but it was happiness nonetheless. Six thought that the circumstances could have been better, considering the large battle was drawing closer and even though the Legion’s forces, according to Vulpes and the other high ranking officers, were sound and in very good numbers, Six felt unease.   
Vulpes had left her in the camp a week earlier for some mission he didn’t let her in on and as soon as she noticed the troops were gathering to move out, she knew something was happening. The wheels were starting to turn and the Legion was moving towards the dam for its glorious revenge.   
Soon, there was hardly anyone left at the Fort, except for slaves and the odd recruit keeping an eye on the women and slaves. They had all moved out and as Six stood, looking out over the vast range of land laying open below her from the steep sides of Fortification Hill, she saw the long-stretched lines of legionaries moving away, marching towards the dam.

***

Six had disappeared, Mr. House was dead, the monorail at Camp McCarran had been blown up by what the NCR officials suspected was Legion terrorists, the Great Khans were allied to Caesar – as well as the White Glove Society and the Omertas. That more or less left what was left of the Chairmen – and the NCR. Fortunately, neither the NCR nor the Legion had been able to get the Boomers on their side, which evened out the odds somewhat, Boone was however, still very concerned as he watched the Legion’s troops move from their two largest encampments as he sat in the sniper's nest just above Cottonwood Cove. It was here he had shot Carla, when she had been taken by those godless slavers and he couldn’t help to snort bitterly at the irony of yet another woman dragging him in to the viper’s nest – Six.  
From months of gathering information about what could have happened to her, they finally found out that she had been taken by the Legion. Boone groaned silently to himself at the thought of her being held as a slave and he had told Veronica and Cass that he’d be damned if he wouldn’t get her out.

Their plan was that both Cass and Veronica would sneak into both camps, posing as slaves trying to locate Six, whilst Boone and his rifle lay in the shadows, watching and taking out anything they couldn’t handle themselves. As far as they had thought, no matter who won the clash between the NCR and the Legion at Hoover Dam, this was their safest bet to get Six out of the Legion’s grasp. If she still lived, that is. 

Together, Boone and Veronica had been able to rile up a small motley crew of individuals during the months Six had been missing, they may have been a strange bunch, but they were effective. Cass had jumped on board almost instantly, as she had taken a liking to Six from the first time she had met her. Arcade, the doctor who had patched up Six once in the Old Mormon Fort had been helpful during the last six months in patching both Boone and Veronica up, especially Boone. Even though he was the one sneaking around in the shadows with his rifle, he managed to get hurt more than twice as often as Veronica or Cass. Frankly, it was humiliating, Boone thought. Cass was a drunkard and Veronica, she was Brotherhood and well trained in combat, but lately, she had taken to roaming around the wasteland in summer dresses, claiming she was tired of the grimy, ugly clothes she wore when she left her ‘family’. 

Arcade had insisted on staying at the Mormon Fort during the battle over Hoover Dam, taking care of hurt soldiers who might make their way back to New Vegas from the dam. Boone and the two women had understood his hesitation to leave Freeside for Legion camps and so they agreed that if and when they found Six – because she had to be either in Cottonwood or in the Fort – they would return to Freeside and meet up with Arcade. After that, hopefully the NCR would win the battle and drive back the Legion, leaving New Vegas in peace, annexed by the Republic. 

_Well, that didn’t happen_.

***

“Oh my god! Six, wake up”, Six was lying in Vulpes and her tent, sleeping, when she stirred from her rest in the middle of the night when a female voice she faintly recognized sounded close to her. She could feel hands on her arm and shoulder and she looked around in the dark inside the tent.  
“Wha…”, Six groaned, “He’s not here…go bother someone else”, she murmured and pushed her head down into her pillow again. Stupid slaves, waking me up in the middle of the night when I’m actually sleeping for once, Six thought to herself and moved a little, making herself comfortable again.  
“Six, it’s me!” the voice hissed.  
“She ain’t here?” another female voice that Six thought sounded familiar sounded from behind her.  
“She is, but she’s sleeping and-“, the voice cut off and a gasp was heard, “My god Cass, look!”  
“What?” a few light steps in the pounded mud floor came closer.  
“She’s…look”  
“Motherfucker!” the other voice snarled under her breath. “That’s it, we need to get her out of here, I’m going to the dam, taking out as many of these Legion bastards as possible”  
“Six, please wake up, we gotta go”, the first voice said and suddenly four arms dragged Six out of the bed.

Six was a heavy sleeper, but she would normally wake up quite easy from having unknown people in her home. However, her pregnancies had all been difficult, according to Vulpes, and this one was no different. She had trouble sleeping and when she finally fell asleep, her body refused to wake up. Her mind was dulled and her body just didn’t compute. That is what happened that night when Boone, Cass and Ronnie had decided to stage a rescue mission. A rescue mission that from the rescuer’s point of view, had only good intentions. The problem was, Six didn’t want to be rescued. She had made her choice six months ago, to stay with the Legion and her family. It was with Caesar that her home was, with Vulpes and Atticus, and now she had another baby on the way. She was five months pregnant and it was already showing quite a bit, especially since Vulpes had been persistent in her regaining her ‘softness’, as he put it. 

Six was being more or less carried out of her tent, carried or dragged or just a mixture of both, she didn’t know. She wasn’t fully awake and all that she knew was that she was clutching her pillow tightly doing everything she could to become comfortable in her bed again. But as she was laid down on something hard, that she realized was not a bed nor smelled of Vulpes, she understood that something was amiss and she woke up.   
Six looked around her with hazily scared eyes, wondering how she suddenly was on a small raft. “Where’s Vulpes?” she asked before she recognized the three people around her.  
“Vulpes?” Boone asked.   
“Boone, Cass, Ronnie – gods, what are you doing here?” Six looked perplexed, touching Veronica who sat closest to her.   
“We’re rescuing you, of course! What else?” Veronica said, patting Six’s shoulder. “Are you hurt?”   
“What the fuck have those bastards done to ya?” Cass snarled, looking at Six’s stomach, which caught Boones attention and his eyes widened in the darkness of the night sky. 

It dawned on Six what exactly was happening and she felt the panic build up inside her, “What are you doing?” she almost shouted. “Take me back, now!”   
“What?” Cass spat.   
“You’re kidnapping me!” Six tugged at Ronnie’s dress, “They’ll kill me, I won’t ever be able to go back now – take me back!”   
“Are you insane?” Cass looked at her with utter surprise, “There’s no way in hell we’re taking you back there, not when we’ve got you out, fuck that”   
“You can’t seriously want to go back?” Veronica looked at Six with raised eyebrows.   
“I didn’t _want_ to leave!”, Six roared, trying to get up but was immediately stopped by Boone’s large arms who had dropped the oar he was using to pull their raft over the Colorado.   
“She’s been brainwashed”, Cass murmured and Boone shook his head in disbelief.   
“Listen, Six, you’ve got to come with us. Those people are animals, you’re not safe there”, Boone said.   
“ _No_ ”, Six roared in desperation, “No, no, no! Adiuva me placere! Aliquis, quaeso!”   
“What the hell is she screaming?” Boone hissed to Cass and Veronica.   
“The fuck should I know?” Cass shrugged.   
“Six, please”, Veronica gripper Six’s shoulders, “There’s nobody here, they’re dead”   
“What? Vulpes’ dead?” Six looked beyond scared and with that, she tried to throw herself of the raft, but Boone caught her quickly again, hauling her back into his strong grip.   
“Who?” Cass looked strangely at her again, “You mean Vulpes Inculta? Now _that’d_ be the day!”   
“He’s not dead?” Six looked around at her three ‘captors’.   
“I wish”, Boone murmured, “Why do you care, anyway?”   
“You need to take me to him, you need to give me back to him, you hear? You need to do it _now_ ”, Six was looking beyond panicked as she stared around the raft.   
“Fuck no, you’re coming back with us – away from the Legion and that fucking maniac Inculta”, Boone hissed.   
“Is he the one…”, Veronica nodded to her belly.   
“Yes”, Six hissed looking confused, “Of course he is! Who else?”   
“Yeah, ‘who else?’” Boone said in a bitter tone. “He’s a dead man”   
“No!” Six screamed again, “Don’t you dare!”   
“What the hell’s wrong with you, Six?” Cass gripped her shoulders as Boone held her, “Huh? What did that psycho do to you?”   
“Where do you people get off? What gives you the right to just up and take me, against my will?” Six snarled, “Turn around, at once!”   
“Six, calm down”, Boone tried to speak in a sober tone. 

_This_ , this wouldn’t do, Six thought. Sure, they had good intentions, but it wouldn’t do at all. She needed to get away from them, as soon as possible and make her way to Vulpes some how. Why the hell had they killed everyone who was left in the camps? Why had they come for her? She hardly knew them – the person she had spent the longest time with was Boone, and she hadn’t even been sure he liked her all that much anyway.   
They were kind people that meant well, sure, but it wasn’t up to them. _So, all right Aurelia_ , her mind pondered, _play it cool. Calm down and make them think you’ve accepted your fate and at first chance, run like hell for the hills_.   
“I’m calm”, Six said, breathing heavily. Oh gods, this is not happening, is it? Why did Vulpes take of the collar? If she had still been wearing the collar, they wouldn’t have been able to bring her outside the camp without it killing her. Dying had been preferable to whatever consequences this idiotic little stunt could end up having. But no, she just had to go and become pregnant. Vulpes had no more but touched her and there she was, knocked up – again – even though it felt like the first time for her. When they had found out three months ago, Vulpes took the collar off immediately, too scared to accidentally kill a son – and of course, Six had behaved herself. 

Fuck. FUCK.   
_All right, just relax and be patient. A few hours on a raft and then you can run like the wind_ , she heard Vulpes voice inside her head. _Trust me Lupa, just come to me, it will be all right_.

***

While they had been on the raft, Six had had enough time and then some to plan how she was going to flee and what way she was going to take. Luckily she had seen which way the troops had moved and she would try to follow them as best she could. She would need to try and find one of the officers she knew, well, if she was being completely honest she didn’t care who she caught up with, as long as it wasn’t her father. The other praefecti and centuri were all right, she thought, all but Aurelius of Phoenix, the disgusting monster. To think she was his blood, it made her nauseous just thinking about it.  
The first chance she got, when the other three was just a bit distracted, she would bolt. She had done it before, not that she could remember, but it meant she could do it again. Five month’s pregnant or not, it didn’t matter.

Six was surprised at how fast she got her chance, they had just put their feet down on dry land when Boone and Veronica got their hands full with Cass who had spent the hours on the raft drinking her sea sickness away. She stooped straight down into the dirt, drunk off her ass and when Boone and Veronica shot down after her, checking to see that she was all right, Six bolted.   
She ran, ran as fast as she could into the shadowy hills just beyond Cottonwood and she didn’t stop. Her body felt heavy from the added weight of her stomach and she quickly became out of breath, not having moved much in the last months. She hadn’t done any hard labor or even been much outside her tent, and suddenly, she needed to run, run until she didn’t have any skin left on her feet. It was first when she had disappeared into the rocks, shielded by high cacti and the darkness of the hills that she heard Boone and Ronnie shout and call after her.   
She had gotten away, thank the gods, but she was far from safe yet, she needed to keep going. The last troops had left yesterday and she should be able to catch up with at least the last ones and she also needed to make sure not to die. 

Then it dawned on her. She was five months pregnant, dressed in a toga and sandals, without any food or water and she didn’t even have a weapon. She was fucking screwed. Then again, she had survived a pair of bullets to the head, this was nothing compared to that – she had her legs and as long as she could run away from bad things, she had a good chance. Perhaps she could find some weapon on the way if she was lucky. Otherwise, she’d just have to take her chances. She was out of options at this point. 

When her legs had become too tired to run, she walked and walked and walked. She walked for what seemed like an eternity. The sun had risen in the sky hours ago and now burned her uncovered arms and shoulders. She untied a part of her toga and draped it around her body, creating a hood to cover her head and shoulders. She couldn’t completely cover her arms, but at least she wasn’t sizzling at this point, she was just sweating to death. And was she ever thirsty?   
She had just picked some prickly pear fruit, before she was almost attacked by cazadores, but she had managed to find a small shed and hid inside it, until the mutated insects tired of sniffing her out and left. She spent her time inside the shed eating the fruit and digging around the junk that had been left in there. To her great surprise, she found a pair of shades and two bottles of old beer. She needed to drink something and surely the gods and Caesar would forgive her for drinking some beer, instead of dying from dehydration and killing an unborn child along with herself.   
Six kept walking and was able to avoid the worst dangers that the wasteland presented by dodging and hiding as best she could. She tried to move in the shadows most of the time, avoiding raiders and large predators. A couple of geckos had tried to attack her, but she had broken one of the beer bottle and used the glass as a weapon, killing the lizards with some difficulty – but they were dead and now she was covered in gecko blood and her own blood from the bites she’d gotten. 

When the sky was starting to become dark and the chill of the desert night was blowing in over the dynes, it was as if the gods had answered her prayers. She saw _legionaries_. Legionaries moving over the boulder ahead and she started walking fast, eventually running and when she was close enough, she shouted to gain their attention.   
It was an assassination squad headed by a vexillarius, which meant it was a high ranked assassination squad she had run into. The vexillarius noticed her and aimed his scope at her, probably looking to assess if she was a threat or not. She held her hands up in surrender and kept them up as she walked closer.   
“Ave, true to Caesar”, Six shouted in Latin, “I am a citizen of Caesar’s lands” 

The vexillarius held his hand up to his men and walked towards her to meet her. For a moment she thought he looked exactly like her husband, but his armor was of a simpler cut and Vulpes never bore a Legion flag, nor a sniper rifle.   
“A woman of Caesar, alone in the desert?” the vexillarius looked at her as he stopped before her and inspected her from behind his goggles. Six took off her shades and looked up at the man.   
“I was kidnapped from Fortification Hill, but managed to escape, I need-“, Six was interrupted by the man holding his hand up in her face.   
“State your name and to whom you belong, woman”   
“My name is Aurelia Inculta of Phoenix, I am the wife of Vulpes Inculta”   
“And the daughter of my centurion”, the vexillarius stated dryly. “I will bring you to your father’s camp”   
_Fuck_ , Six thought to herself. Anyone but her father, please gods. Oh well, Aurelius didn’t own her so he couldn’t do her any physical harm, especially not since Vulpes held a higher rank than he did as a centurion, perhaps he could just help having her escorted to Vulpes. Six couldn’t imagine the bastard wanted her in his camp for longer than was absolutely necessary. 

“First however, I need to see your brand”, the legionary said and Six arched a brow in question. “We’re at war, woman, there are spies everywhere. Do as you're told”   
“Yes, of course sir”, Six nodded and pulled down the cloth she had covering her hair and shoulders. She turned around and removed her hair to show the brand that was burned into her skin just below the nape of her neck.   
“Everything looks to be in order. Follow me”, he said and gesticulated with his rifle for her to walk ahead of him. She walked over to the small group of legionaries that waited for them up on the small boulder.   
The vexillarius explained the situation in short words to the other legionaries and soon they walked east with Six being escorted between to assassins with the vexillarius and a veteran in front and another veteran walking last behind them. 

Six was brought to a smaller camp between two large boulders, shadowed by large rocks and then lead into a cave where her father stood leaned over a large makeshift table, for once not wearing his galea – instead it had been sat down on his table. Behind him was a cot on which a naked girl lay sleeping. She must have been _at least_ five years younger than Six and she shivered at the thought of what that poor girl had to put up with, having ended up in the clutches of her father.   
“Ave, true to Caesar”, the vexillarius saluted the centurion with a raised arm.   
Aurelius lazily lifted his hand without looking up from his maps and documents. “Why do you disturb me this late?” he hissed.   
“We found your daughter wandering around the desert”, the vexillarius said. That made the centurion look up and his eyes fell straight at Six and his lips curled back in a snarl as he stared at her with piercing eyes that bore through her soul. “She claims to have been abducted and was trying to find her way to her husband, Inculta”   
“And instead you brought the whore here?” Aurelius snarled and banged his fist so hard into the makeshift table it cracked and sacked down on the ground.  
“Where’s my husband, father?” Six said in a calm voice. It wouldn’t do to let on how scared her father actually made her and so she tried to steady herself as much as possible.   
“How the fuck should I know? He’s a frumentarius, he could be anywhere”, he hissed as he stopped right in front of her. “How could a woman like your mother birth such an insolent daughter, I wonder”, he cupped her chin and inspected her face, turning it back and forth.   
“If you don’t know where my husband is, could you have me transported to Lord Caesar?” Six said, still having her father’s fingers around her chin.   
“You’re his whore now?” he hissed, leaning in and smelling her hair.   
Six didn’t answer, instead she focused on standing her ground and trying not to be too imitated by the sick bastard sniffing out his own daughter. 

“Leave”, Aurelius made a gesture for the vexillarius to leave them alone and he saluted the centurion and left. Her father’s hand left her chin and snaked its way down her throat and back around to her neck. “You look like your mother did when she bore you”, he said in a hushed voice, trailing his eyes down on her breasts and swollen stomach. “So I am to be a grandfather, again, hm? Let’s hope it’s another boy, not some useless daughter. Thankfully, all your daughters so far have died – it seems the gods are looking out for you”   
“So it seems”, Six answered dryly without looking at her father, standing so close to her, she could almost feel what felt unnervingly like a man’s arousal against her hip.   
“Have you eaten?” he asked, grinning as he traced her collarbone with a finger.   
“I have not”  
Aurelius stepped back and roared for a slave to come and quicker than a gust of wind, a skinny old woman stood before them, looking down into the ground.   
“My daughter decided to come visit me, she has not eaten. Prepare her a cot for the night and some food. I suspect she’ll be wanting a bath as well, no?”   
Six nodded.   
“I’m guessing Lord Caesar wants his whores clean”, Aurelius mumbled as he waved the slave away. “The slave will show you to a suitable tent for the night, try not to fall on any cocks during the night, I doubt even your husband’s patience stretches that far”, he said before walking off further into the cave. 

Six let out a breath she hadn’t realized she was holding and followed the slave out of the cave and into a tent just a few feet away from the entrance. This was going to be a long night.

***


	12. From the Watchtower

The next day, Six was being escorted by a group of recruits to Caesar’s hold-out just outside the dam, where the majority of his forces had gathered and was holding out until they could make their attack.  
The escort took little more than a day, they set out early in the morning and arrived at the large camp around midnight. The trek through the desert was mainly uneventful for Six, since the legionaries took care of any dangers that approached them, which turned out to be nothing worse than a few geckos, since the roads they stuck to were patrolled and held by the Legion. 

Two days of walking had taken its toll on Six and the sleep she had gotten last night were more or less non-existent. She hated her father and she felt anything but safe alone with him in such a close distance to her. Nothing had happened during the night, but it hadn’t stopped her from lying on the cot, half awake keeping one eye constantly open. So when she entered the center of the camp that held the tents of Caesar, she almost stumbled in through the praetorians guarding the entrance. They called for Lucius, since the gathered officers were still sitting down for a dinner with some entertainment. Six got the distinct feeling the entertainment wasn’t something that was suitable for a married woman and from the noises she overheard, coming from one of the larger tents, she gathered she was right. 

Soon the bearded man she knew as the praefectus of the praetorians came into view and Six fell to her knees and greeted him as a woman should, by kissing his knuckles and bowing her head.  
“Ave Aurelia”, Lucius said in his usual calm tone. He was a kind man by legion standards and quite pleasant to be around, unless he got provoked into loosing his temper, then the sheer force from the somewhat aged man was frightening to say the least. But he was a fair and solid man and well respected by both his men and by Caesar. Six was constantly surprised that he hadn’t been made legate after Joshua Graham had been disowned and cast out from a canyon. “I’m sorry to say that Inculta hasn’t arrived yet, but we’re expecting him any day now. He’s had some business to conclude elsewhere but he is supposed to be back before Kimball’s speech in two days”  
“Thank you, Lucius”, Six said and kissed his hand again.  
“Stand, woman”, Lucius said and patted her cheek and Six did as she was told. “Come, let’s sit down for a bit before you turn in for the night. Would you like something, it must have been a long trip?”  
“For the baby”, Six nodded. “Vulpes is very meticulous about me eating enough”  
“Rightly so”, Lucius nodded and gestured towards an armchair within an open-walled tent with a small fire burning inside. He then waved for a slave to bring some food and sat down on the chair beside her. “What happened?” 

Six didn’t know if she was going to tell the truth, she was sure that if she was to tell Lucius and later Caesar and Vulpes about Boone, Ronnie and Cass’s rescue, they would soon have bounties on their heads and Six didn’t actually dislike them. Quite the contrary, she liked them very much and she understood why they had tried to save her, it was noble of them. If she had any friends at all, she supposed they would be it – but in comparison to her son and her unborn child, friends were futile. But she didn’t want to see them dead, at least not indirectly from her. Therefore, she decided to lie. She didn’t know whether it was the smart thing to do, but as far has guilt came, she didn’t fancy living with it unnecessarily if she could find a way to avoid it. 

“A few masked people raided the camp and took me while I was sleeping. I never saw their faces and since I’ve been sleeping so little these past few weeks, I was hazy when they rallied me out of bed and dragged me away”, Six explained. It wasn’t completely untrue. It was best to try and stay with as much of the truth as possible.  
“You didn’t recognize anything about them? Movements, voices?”  
“No, it’s all very blurry. I was afraid for my child”  
“I understand completely, Aurelia”, Lucius nodded. He himself had several children and only by his long time wife. It was something that apparently was unusual within the Legion. Six thought it admirable and the fact that she had found out that Vulpes had children with others than her, was something that made her boil with jealousy and anger. However, she tried to conceal it and ignore it as much as possible, for her own good. “It’s good that you took the chance to run the way you did and impressive how you handled yourself, in your condition nonetheless, for such a long stretch. Vulpes taught you well”  
“Yes, I understand he had me trained in the martial arts”  
“That he did, good thinking, as always, on his part”, Lucius nodded and looked up at the slave that was bringing in a few plates of meats, fruits and cheeses. 

They sat and ate, talking a little back and forth until Six felt full and started to yawn. She was spent, completely. She couldn’t remember the last time she was this tired and soon a slave escorted her to Vulpes’ tent and when she arrived, a bath had already been drawn for her. It was unusual even within the cities of the wasteland to bathe this often, but it was rather common within the Legion. Health and hygiene was important and it wouldn’t do for at least the higher-ranking officers to walk around filthy. Vulpes was almost obsessive about his baths and took one at least every night, or a shower if it was possible, depending on the circumstances he found himself in.  
Most things in this camp were makeshift and there wasn’t a bed in the tent, only one small cot and an armchair, but it would have to do. Her back would probably kill her tomorrow for sleeping on bad military equipment, but it was not like she had any other choice, and a low cot was better than the hard ground.

***

Vulpes arrived at the encampment closer to the dam in the early hours of the morning, there was still some noise going on from Caesar’s tents, they had probably held a celebration rallying up the officers and centurions for the coming battle. He ignored it, however and went straight to his tent, tired from travelling the whole day before and the night – you could imagine his surprise when he opened the tent-flap and found his wife sleeping in his cot. Something had happened and considering her condition and the fact that she was actually sleeping, he decided not to wake her. The cot itself was too small for them both, so he settled for the armchair, which he dragged closer to the cot, so he at least could sleep with his feet off the ground. His whole body was aching, but he was to tired to order a slave to have another cot brought in and considering the fact that Aurelia was carrying around another life inside of her, it was important that she was as comfortable as possible. But why was she here?  
Lately, he thought, she had turned up in the strangest of places – but he was somehow glad it was the sight of her that had met him. He had spent the last couple of nights in Vegas, sleeping with an informant from inside the NCR and the woman was a hassle. Manish in her ways, but pretty enough on the outside. Her attitude had him long for his wife, he liked women with some fierceness in them – but there was a line for everything and the fact that he couldn’t beat the NCR bitch up when she was starting to give him lip, frustrated him without measure. Once he had returned to the Fort so angry he had almost fucked a slave to death, taking his frustrations out on her during their copulation. It was better that the useless slaves took the consequences of his anger, rather than Aurelia. He never actually wanted to hurt her, specially not now, when she was carrying.

He had gotten his armor off and tugged his feet out of his boots and when he sat down in the armchair and put his feet up on the cot, he was hardly able to take a full breath before he wandered off to sleep, feeling the warmth of Aurelia’s soft shins against his feet.

***

Vulpes lay on his stomach in the tower peeking through the scope of his MSR rifle, following president Kimball’s movements as he stepped out of the vertibird and down onto the large stage. The dam was filled with NCR soldiers, higher ranked military officials and politicians who had gathered to listen to the speech being held by the president who had flown in from Shady Sands. Vulpes grinned thinking about the fact that the Legion had been able to hide an entire army between the large boulders without the NCR noticing, now they simply needed to incite the final move against the dam, by executing the profligate president.  
Caesar and Legate Lanius was waiting for his signal, along with a dozen centurions and two cohorts, which in total were over a thousand legionaries waiting to storm the dam. Further away, they had even more legionaries lying in wait – the triumph was going to be glorious.

On the other side of the stage, hidden on the roof, was Cato, also equipped with a MSR rifle and at Vulpes’ signal, Cato would fire four rapid shots into Colonel Moore’s head whilst Vulpes’ fire an equal amount of shots into President Kimball’s head. Just after that, both Cato and Vulpes’ are to detonate one C4-bomb each and then head for their ‘safe-house’, signaling the legate to initiate the large attack. 

It was glorious.  
The way both Colonel Moore’s head and Kimball’s head exploded from the impact of the .300 Winchester Magnum’s entering their skulls. Vulpes’ thought about Aurelia being shot in the head and concluded that it was fortunate Benny had been stupid enough to use a 9mm. It was a typical idiocy common amongst the thick-skulled gangsters of New Vegas and New Reno to use simple handguns during a hit when you wanted the victim to die and stay dead. If one really wanted a person dead, the best way to secure such a death was with heavy artillery or through blissful gory melee.  
Vulpes’ signaled Cato again and they both set off the bombs and when the explosions sounded, both legionaries were making their way, incognito in NCR-armor, from their respective towers popping stealth boys, and headed towards their signaling point.  
Now, the time was ripe for battle and Vulpes could already taste the blood in his mouth and he quickly changed into his vexillarius helmet and legionary armor.  
Tonight he was to bathe in the glory of the profligate’s blood.

***

Six was waiting out the battle in the relative security at Caesar’s camp with the few troops of reserve veterans and praetorian’s guarding Caesar. The Legion’s tactic during battle was to first use the less experienced legionaries – and then as they died off, more and more experienced men entered the battle, therefore, the NCR had to make their way through a vast amount of legionaries only to reach to the decani, controlling the lowest ranking legionaries. The praefecti entered the battle last together with the centuria and if they where forced to enter the battle, the Legion had lost. Then of course, many of the praefecti and the legate chose to enter the battle willingly, mainly due to bloodlust and the fact that it was inspiring for the regular legionaries to fight along side their leaders.

Caesar however, did not enter the battle, as he oversaw it and Six spent her time with his favorite slaves that he had brought with him from the Fort. The women sat together playing chess and talking, trying to pass the time. Waiting during a battle was tedious and you mostly spent your time in agony hoping the ones you love comes back. Since Caesar was actually there, the only one with any kind of worry, was Six. However, Caesar seemed confident and spent most of his time reading, when he wasn’t collecting reports from messengers running between the camp and the dam, or getting his cock sucked by one of his slaves. Six just wanted time to move faster and she sat with a hand against her stomach, staring either on the chess pieces, or towards the dam, even though you couldn’t see anything from the camp itself. They had snipers and lookouts up on the high hills surrounding them who sent down reports, but none of the women were allowed to leave the camp. 

Vulpes hadn’t been very angry with her when she woke up to find him back in the camp the other day. Though he had questioned her extensively on the kidnappers and she was entirely sure that he didn’t believe that she hadn’t known who was trying to kidnap her. But he hadn’t made a big deal out of it, instead he had expressed admiration of how she had handled the situation.  
It had eased her mind to know that he wasn’t angry, however, she knew it also had to do with his mood. Fortunately, the battle had coincided with one of his moods, that Six learned he had. It seems the moods had been harder for him to control when he was younger, but now, he seemed to be able to let the beast out when he needed to, especially during battle and he spent the whole day yesterday being in a most fantastical mood, laughing almost psychotically and Six did her best to keep up with him as he dashed through the camp in preparation for the day to come. 

Before he left early this morning, he had dragged her out of bed, killed a hen and covered himself and Six in its blood, ravishing her in what he called an offering to the god of war, Mars. She had only witnessed his periodical madness once – as far as her memory went, in any case – and the look he had in his eyes when he fucked her that morning, was anything but sane. He looked like a mixture of insanely happy and like someone about to crack completely, laughing like a jet addict when he came inside her. Six had thought that the offering of the animal was enough, but she had read that the expectations of incoming battle could do things to men, it had something to do with the testosterone – linking the violence of battle to sexual arousal.  
Thankfully, it was a quick affair and before she knew it, he was gone.

***

_It was done_. The NCR had been forced to retreat and now Vulpes walked through the masses of corpses littered over the dam. Around him he could hear screams of men and women being raped and beaten, he could hear the crying of females being rounded up and taken as slaves and the gurgling sounds made by the soldiers who had not yet died but were choking on their own blood. The world around him was blurry, but oh so beautiful. This was always his favorite part, when the adrenaline had made his body numb and the burning pain of his wounds no longer bothered him. The smell of metallic from the blood around him, mixed with gunpowder, dust and shit. It was what life smelled like. It was the smell of death that brought forth the victory and the purest form of life he could imagine. He couldn’t help but to laugh out of pure joy as he walked through the limp flesh of their enemies or fallen comrades. Hopefully they would be able to take some high-ranking NCR officials alive, he felt an itch inside him that needed to be sated.

He walked past the beast, Lanius who at the moment was claiming his victory in the same manner as so many of the other legionaries – by impaling a captured female NCR ranger veteran over his dick, probably killing her at the same time. _What a beautiful sight_ , Vulpes thought calmly to himself – after letting out his own rage and internal violence through combat, he walked around in complete bliss, as if he’d had the most perfect orgasm. Everything around him felt good and perfect, they had won. It was glorious, however, their work was far from over and there would be celebrations to be held, women to be fucked and men to be put down.  
They were all animals, himself included, but that was the rules of war. Those rules had been the same since before time itself. _Victori sunt spolia_ , to the victor goes the spoils – as some long dead senator from the 19th century apparently had said once. It was true enough, Vulpes thought as he kicked some of the corpses out of his way and made his way towards the slaves being gathered up. He could afford himself a new pet, couldn’t he? Aurelia would probably protest, but what he did and did not do, wasn’t up to her. There would come time for celebration, of that he was certain and it was good to be prepared. However, after this victory, they only needed to annex New Vegas, then – then he would certainly be celebrating.

***

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This was part one of the Aurelia of Phoenix-series. I am working on the second part as we speak.


End file.
